The controversy surrounding a Taiwanese member of a K-pop girl-group continues.
The teenage pop star waved a Taiwanese flag on a Korean TV show and has sparked a cross-Strait
political row.
Park Ji-won reports.
It all started with a waving of Taiwanese flag on a Korean entertainment program,...
after 16-year old K-pop group member Tzu-yu,.. born and raised in Taiwan,... introduced her
homeland to the Korean viewers.
It was innocuous enough to Koreans,... but not to Chinese viewers.
The Taiwanese flag is considered a symbol of Taiwan's pro-independence movement,...
the teenage pop star released a video apology last Friday,... saying she feels deep remorse
for her actions,... and stressed there is only one China.
The K-pop star's agency JYP also released an apology statement the same day,.saying
the agency was not prudent enough with regards to the sensitivity of the matter.
Taiwanese citizens expressed anger over the teenage singer's apology on the day of its
presidential election a day after the video was uploaded.
It became a main issue during the election over the weekend,... and analysts said the
flag row may have widened the main opposition's victory margin by some one percent.
The main opposition party is skeptical about closer ties with Beijing,... gaining a majority
in the parliament for the first time.
"We need to make sure the world realizes that there is nothing wrong with waving the Taiwanese
flag.
It's not something that should be condemned."
With the flag-row deepening,...
Taiwanese citizens are organizing a massive protest on Sunday,... and about 10-thousand
people have expressed willingness to join the movement.
Amid the controversy, the official website of JYP,..
Taiwanese teen's Korean agency,... was hacked over the weekend.
The website remains down,... and the agency says at the moment,..it does not know the
source of the cyber attack.
Park Ji-won, Arirang News.