In a written briefing that afternoon, Democratic Party spokesperson Jeon Su-mi said, “The People Power Party must immediately stop this disgraceful practice of exploiting the pain of the Cheonan victims’ families for political ends.” She dismissed the People Power Party’s call for President Lee to demand an apology from North Korea as “a thin anti-North campaign recycled every election season,” and added, “The Lee administration will not escalate tensions on the Korean Peninsula with empty, provocative rhetoric.”
Earlier that morning, People Power Party leader Jang Dong-hyuk criticized the president on social media, writing, “I’ll say just one thing: would you agree just because North Korea asks for talks?” The comment followed reports that at the March 27 ‘West Sea Defense Day’ ceremony the president told the Cheonan families, “Would North Korea apologize just because we tell them to?” Song Eon-seok, the party’s floor leader, also faulted the president, saying that rebuking the families “amounts to denying the very meaning of the state’s existence.”
