SOUTH Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol and a visiting delegation of US senators today condemned the “indiscriminate attack” by Palestinian militant group Hamas on Israel after a meeting in Seoul, Yoon’s office said.

The bipartisan delegation, led by US Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, also discussed the North Korean nuclear threat during the visit, which follows a high-profile trip to Beijing where the senators met with Chinese President Xi Jinping.

“The president and the Senate delegation condemned Hamas’ indiscriminate attack on Israel,” Yoon’s office said, adding the two countries would “play a constructive role” in easing tensions in the Middle East.

The six senators also discussed the threat presented by Pyongyang’s nuclear programme and South Korea’s steadily tightening defence relationship with the United States and Japan.

Yoon emphasised “the importance of showing a resolute response posture and strong solidarity” between Seoul, Tokyo and Washington “at a time when the North is making more explicit nuclear threats”, his office said.

During Schumer’s meeting with Xi on Monday, the senator had expressed his disappointment in Beijing’s public response to the Hamas attack.

China’s foreign ministry on Sunday called for all sides to show “calm” and “cease fire immediately”, without explicitly condemning the Palestinian attack that has left about 1,200 people in Israel dead.

Officials in Gaza have reported 1,055 people killed in Israel’s campaign of air and artillery strikes on the Palestinian enclave. 

Schumer last week announced he would lead the bipartisan group of lawmakers to China, Japan and South Korea in a trip focused on “economic competition and security, American national security, and global leadership in advanced technology”.

Yesterday, Washington’s embassy in Tokyo said the Japanese leg of that trip had been cancelled “due to external events”.

The cancellation comes after the United States said 14 Americans were dead and others likely being held hostage by Hamas after its surprise attack on Israel.

South Korea’s foreign ministry said Wednesday that a Korean Air flight carrying 192 South Koreans from Israel had arrived at Incheon International Airport in the morning, while another 30 citizens would fly home later this week on Turkish Airlines. – AFP, October 11, 2023.