South Korea's new president vows to restart talks with North Korea
Lee, who was sworn in early on Wednesday following his victory in a snap election, outlined key policy goals for his five-year term, from foreign and economic policy to healing the country's political divide.
In his inaugural address to the country's National Assembly, Lee pledged to deal with North Korean nuclear and other military threats with 'strong deterrence' bolstered by the South Korea-US military alliance.
However, he also said he would restart talks with Pyongyang, which have not taken place in years, vowing to 'open a communication channel with North Korea and establish peace on the Korean Peninsula through talks and cooperation'.
How this will be received remains unclear, as Pyongyang has rejected talks with Seoul since 2019.
While critics of the liberal have previously accused Lee of looking toward China and North Korea and away from the US and Japan, the leader also stressed that he wanted to grow the trilateral Seoul-Washington-Tokyo cooperation.
"Through pragmatic diplomacy based on national interests, we will turn the crisis posed by the major shift in global economic and security landscapes into an opportunity to maximise our national interests,' Lee said.
Lee's government will be forced to reckon with myriad challenges, including a slowing domestic economy, US tariff hike and a volatile international context.
Lee, whose election victory came after a snap election was triggered in April by the removal of former conservative President Yoon Suk-yeol following his failed attempt to impose martial law last year, has repeatedly emphasised Seoul's alliance with Washington as the cornerstone of its foreign policy.
Congratulating Lee on his election, Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba said he wants to hold summit talks with Lee 'as early as possible' to further promote bilateral ties, while the US State Department said that Seoul and Washington share 'an ironclad commitment' to the alliance based on their 'mutual defence treaty, shared values, and deep economic ties'.
As well as foreign policy, the new president, who won 49.3% of the votes cast in Tuesday's election against the main conservative contender Kim Moon-soo's 41.3%, pledged to wage a 'head-on battle' against the threats of recession in the country and boost government spending.
Addressing the historic constitutional crisis that led to his presidency, Lee promised an in-depth investigation into Yoon's imposition of martial law, while calling for the country to come together and heal the divisions that followed the shocking incident last December.
Alongside US tariffs, North Korea's growing military deals with Russia will pose an undeniable challenge.
North Korea has been providing Russia with weapons and soldiers as it wages its war against Ukraine, with Pyongyang acknowledging for the first time in April that it has sent troops to fight for Russia against Ukraine.
North Korean dictator Kim Jong-un has also expressed his unwavering support for Russia's invasion of Ukraine
South Korea, the US and allies fear that Russia may give Pyongyang technologies to aid its development of its nuclear weapons programme.
Following North Korea's launch of the country's first naval destroyer last month, South Korean officials said the Choe Hyon warship was likely built with the aid of Russia.
State media reported that the ship is designed to carry modern weapons including nuclear missiles, with Dr Edward Howell telling Euronews last month that North Korea's development of warships is central to the regime's aims.
'The nuclear ambitions are inextricably linked with Kim's desire for regime survival, but also to his desire for North Korea to be seen as an equal power, of equal status, to the United States," he said. "The development of these warships is intertwined with this nuclear recognition.'
US Secretary of Defence Pete Hegseth will not attend a NATO-led meeting of more than 50 defence ministers in Brussels on Wednesday, an absence that will be seen as another sign of Washington pulling back from its support for Ukraine against Russia's war.
For the first time since the US created an international group to coordinate military aid to Ukraine three years ago — following Russia's full-scale invasion in February 2022 — a Pentagon chief will not be present at a meeting of the defence ministers.
Hegseth's absence from the meeting of the NATO Ukraine Defence Contact Group (UDCG) was confirmed to Euronews by a spokesperson for the US Department of Defence, who cited scheduling issues.
The US Ambassador to NATO Matthew Whitaker will take his place. Hegseth is set to attend Thursday's meeting of NATO defence ministers.
The UDCG was established by Hegseth's predecessor, Lloyd Austin, and more than 50 member nations have collectively provided Ukraine with some $126 billion (€111bn) in weapons and military assistance, including over $66.5bn (€58bn) from the US.
However, since US President Donald Trump took office in January, there have been no new announcements of US military or weapons aid to Ukraine.
Hegseth turned leadership of the UDCG over to Germany and the United Kingdom in February, and said that Washington would no longer play a role in the monthly meetings.
The NATO defence ministers are expected this week to finalise proposals to increase defence spending from 2% to 5% of GDP, ahead of the NATO leaders summit at the end of June in The Hague — with Trump is expected to attend.
The US president has called for the 5% target, a demand which has been backed up by NATO chief Mark Rutte. However, none of NATO's 32 members — including the US — currently hit that level.
The 5% target is expected to be split into 3.5% of spending directly on defence, and 1.5% on "defence-related" aspects such as cyber warfare and critical infrastructure.
A NATO official told Euronews that "3.5% gives us equivalence with the US".
What might constitute "defence-related spending" will have to be worked out, a source familiar with the issue said, with some NATO countries pushing for things such as "military mobility", including road-building, to be considered part of such spending.
The timeline of when countries should meet the proposed 5% target will also be under discussion, the source said.
The planned rise in spending is in response to US demands that the burden of Europe's security be handled by the continent.
Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine will be one of the main issues at the NATO summit in The Hague, but it is expected to be very different to last year's event in Washington, where Ukrainian Volodymyr President Zelenskyy was at the forefront of proceedings and Kyiv's relationship with Washington was flourishing under the Biden administration.
Zelenskyy said this week that Ukraine had been invited to the NATO summit, but the nature of his country's attendance remains to be seen, given that it is not a member.
Some sources told Euronews that there is broad consensus that Zelenskyy should be present at the summit
'It'll be a PR disaster if he's not there," said one NATO official, speaking on condition of anonymity.
The Dutch king is expected to invite Zelenskyy to a dinner for NATO leaders on the opening night, according to another source.
On Monday, a second round of direct peace talks between Russia and Ukraine in just over two weeks made no progress towards ending the conflict, officials said.
The discussions came a day after a string of astonishing long-range attacks by both sides, with Ukraine launching a devastating drone assault on Russian air bases and Russia hurling its largest drone attack of the war against Kyiv.
NATO officials told Euronews that they were concerned about Russian advances, despite the Ukrainian army's massive attacks on Russian targets in recent days.
'It was a stroke of genius what Ukraine has achieved over the last few days," the NATO official said.
'We are all positive about it — they took out part of the capability to kill children and civilian infrastructure,' the official added.
But while Ukraine's Operation Spiderweb attack on Russia's bomber fleet is regarded as a major setback to Moscow, it does not fundamentally change the situation on the ground.
More than 100 Ukrainian drones hit strategic Russian air bases over the weekend, destroying or damaging nearly a third of the country's bombers, according to Kyiv.
'It doesn't change the battlefield — the hard battlefield reality is that Russia is making progress square kilometre by square kilometre,' the NATO official said.
"And this operation as great as it was, is not stopping the fact that Russia is moving forward and Ukraine is going through a very hard time," the official told Euronews. "The resounding success of Sunday can't take away that fact."
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