The US and Japan yesterday welcomed conservative Lee Myung-bak's election as president of South Korea, expressing hope that the new leader would be firmer on North Korea after a decade of liberal rule in Seoul.
Japanese newspapers expected greater cooperation among Seoul, Tokyo and Washington with the departure of left-leaning President Roh Moo-hyun, who has pursued a "sunshine" policy of reconciliation with the North.
Lee, a former top Hyundai executive who will be the first businessman to lead South Korea, promised yesterday to press the North to improve human rights, saying: "In inter-Korean relations, we should not shy away from criticism."
Lee met yesterday with the US and Japanese ambassadors in Seoul, and US President George W. Bush was reportedly set to telephone him later yesterday.
Bush "looks forward to working with him and maintaining good US-South Korean relations," Gordon Johndroe, a White House spokesman, said in Washington.
Japanese Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda also congratulated Lee and said he hoped to work with him on the "further development in amicable, cooperative relations."
Lee told US Ambassador Alexander Vershbow that "the South Korea-US relationship for the past five years has not gone completely bad, but lacked sufficient trust between the two," Lee's adviser, Yim Sungbin said.
Roh rose to power in 2003 amid a wave of public anger after two schoolgirls were killed in a traffic accident involving a vehicle of US troops based in South Korea.
Roh has clashed with the US over North Korea policy, although he also sent troops to Iraq and Afghanistan and pursued a controversial free-trade deal with the US.
"I think everybody in Tokyo and Washington is happy to see the back of Roh Moo-hyun," said Robert Dujarric, a North Korea watcher at Temple University in Tokyo.
But he cautioned that conservatives in the US should not hope for a U-turn in the policy of engaging the North launched by Roh's Nobel Prize-winning predecessor Kim Dae-jung.
"The debate in South Korea is over the nature and the extent of the engagement. Nobody wants to see North Korea go down the drain," Dujarric said.
Japan's chief government spokesman Nobutaka Machimura said that Tokyo and Seoul "share fundamental values and share an agenda with important issues."
Roh was a fiery critic of Japan over its wartime aggression and sounded alarm bells over Tokyo's claims to a disputed set of islets in the Sea of Japan.
Also see: President congratulates winner of S Korea poll
Also see: Lee vows to revitalize S Korea
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