U.S. contacts 4 major conglomerates to check progress of inter-Korean economic cooperation

SEOUL, Oct. 31 (Yonhap) -- The United States has contacted four major South Korean business groups whose officials joined a trip to Pyongyang last most for an inter-Korean summit, sources at the government and the presidential office said Wednesday. The U.S. Embassy in Seoul made contact with the four major conglomerates -- Samsung, Hyundai, LG and SK. Business leaders from the four groups accompanied South Korean President Moon Jae-in on his three-day summit in Pyongyang in September. The latest contact by the U.S. is interpreted as moves to control the speed at which South Korea puts forth inter-Korean economic projects and call attention to the need to implement sanctions on Pyongyang. It also came amid the stalled denuclearization negotiations between Washington and Pyongyang. It is seen as a rare case for Washington to express its intentions over economic projects between the Koreas via the U.S. Embassy, with presidential spokesman Kim Eui-kyeom telling a press conference the same day that does not appear to be appropriate to comment on the U.S. move. There is a concern among U.S. watchers that Washington's direct contact of South Korean firms without consultations with the presidential office Cheong Wa Dae or the government illustrates the sense that South Korea was left out of the loop. An official at the Foreign Ministry rejected the view, saying a country could make a direct contact with the private sector of the other country in its diplomatic activities unless it is an authoritarian country. "I do not think the U.S. left us out of the loop since it contacted them," he said. "We were aware that the U.S. was expected to make such a contact." The latest U.S. contact with South Korean firms is not the first case in which U.S. officials communicated with South Korean businesspeople about inter-Korean economic projects. Mark Lambert, the State Department's Korea desk director and acting deputy assistant secretary, had a round-table meeting at the embassy in July with about a dozen South Koreans who used to do business in North Korea -- either at the joint industrial complex in Kaesong or at Mount Kumgang for a cross-border tourist program. namsh@yna.co.kr (END)