South Korea’s National Assembly recently became the 32nd legislature to be represented in the Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China, an association of lawmakers concerned about Beijing’s increasingly hostile behaviors.
The first South Korean lawmakers to join the cross-parliamentarian alliance are the ruling People Power Party’s Rep. Ji Seong-ho and the opposition Democratic Party of Korea’s Rep. Oh Yeong-hwan. The two lawmakers will serve as inaugural co-chairs until their tenure in the Assembly ends in April next year.
Ji, a North Korean defector who was elected to the 21st Assembly as a proportional representative in 2020, told The Korea Herald that he hoped to rally more international support against China’s forced repatriation of North Korean defectors detained there.
Oh, who was a firefighter before entering the Assembly, also in 2020, told The Korea Herald that he is taking part in the alliance to make a more definitive stand for human rights.
