South Korea's acting president ordered boosted security measures on Wednesday, saying the country was a major potential terrorism target because it planned to send more troops to Iraq soon.
There has been no known public threat to South Korea, where there are 37,000 US troops based to deter North Korea, but acting president Goh Kun told security officials all countries involved in Iraq needed to be wary.
"We need to be very seriously prepared," Goh said, according to his spokesman. South Korea is sending more than 3,000 troops -- half of them combat-ready force-protection troops -- to Iraq next month to join some 600 medics and engineers already there.
Train bombs killed more than 200 people in Spain last Thursday, and that attack looks increasingly like an al-Qaeda operation. France said on Tuesday it had received threats of attacks by another shadowy Islamist group.
"The major targets of terrorism are countries that deployed troops in Iraq or are assisting it," said Goh. "We can be a possible strong target."
Diplomatic sources said they saw Goh's move as a logical pre-emptive step rather than a response to a specific threat.
Goh, a 66-year-old veteran bureaucrat who is also prime minister, took over as interim leader last Friday after President Roh Moo-hyun was impeached for violating an election law.
On Tuesday, US President George W. Bush called on allies to stick with the US and not cave in to pressure from al-Qaeda by withdrawing their troops.
Goh ordered senior staff, including the security planning chief, to draw up anti-terrorism measures by the end of this week and to start working-level discussions late yesterday, the spokesman said by telephone.
Home Affairs Minister Huh Sung-kwan was to chair a meeting yesterday and Goh will preside over a follow-up session today.
Goh said the three key points were close cooperation with other countries, security measures for transport including a new high-speed railway opening on April 1 and safety for troops going to Iraq. Goh has made clear the troop deployment will go ahead.
The Madrid bombings revived popular anger at Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar's support for the US-led Iraq war, helping incoming Socialist Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodridquez Zapatero to victory. Zapatero has indicated he will pull his country's troops out of Iraq.
Seoul's troop contribution will be the largest after the US and British contingents, a fact not lost on South Korea's media.
"The Korean contingent will be the third-largest foreign force in Iraq after the US and British troops, enough reason to make Korea a major target for al-Qaeda," said the Korea Herald newspaper in an editorial yesterday.
Goh has made stability for Asia's fourth-largest economy, which borders unpredictable North Korea and has no energy resources of its own, his top priority while standing in for Roh.
The Constitutional Court has to decide whether to uphold the opposition-dominated parliament's vote to unseat Roh -- a process that could take up to six months but most legal and political experts say is likely to take about a month. There is a parliamentary election on April 15.
South Korea's central bank has said political uncertainty arising from the impeachment could delay an economic recovery from a consumer credit bubble burst and a global downturn.
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