Coupang founder Kim Bom-suk, proper, speaks to then-U.S. State Secretary nominee Marco Rubio throughout a reception hosted by Donald Trump Jr. in Washington, Jan. 18 (native time). Newsis
Coupang’s important spending on lobbying politicians in the USA has apparently paid off, with Republicans criticizing the Korean authorities’s ongoing investigation into the Seattle-headquartered e-commerce agency.
They denounced Korea’s probe into Coupang as an try and favor China, whereas remaining silent on the corporate’s huge information breach of the private info of 33.7 million customers, allegedly by a former worker who’s a Chinese language nationwide.
Amid rising suspicion that Coupang has been attempting to show the matter right into a diplomatic feud, Seoul is now maintaining a detailed watch on the corporate’s suspected connections with U.S. authorities officers and lawmakers.
Robert O’Brien, who served as nationwide safety adviser in the course of the first Donald Trump administration, stated Tuesday (native time) that the Nationwide Meeting’s aggressive focusing on of Coupang will set the stage for additional discriminatory measures by the Korean Truthful Commerce Fee and broader regulatory obstacles towards U.S. corporations.
“Trump has labored exhausting to rebalance the commerce relationship with Korea, and it might be very unlucky if Korea undermines his efforts by focusing on U.S. tech corporations,” he wrote on social media. “A powerful, coordinated U.S. response is important to safeguard truthful remedy of U.S. corporations and keep strategic stability towards China’s rising financial affect within the sector.”
U.S. President Donald Trump talks to reporters with Robert O’Brien after naming him the White Home nationwide safety adviser at Los Angeles Worldwide Airport in California, Sept. 18, 2019. Reuters-Yonhap
Republican Rep. Darrell Issa additionally talked about Coupang as one of many U.S. tech corporations topic to “a marketing campaign of aggression” from the Korean authorities.
“Particularly, that is being performed by new digital commerce legal guidelines that American corporations will let you know concurrently favor Korean and Chinese language companies and strangle their capacity to function in Korea,” he stated in a column printed Monday (native time) by the Every day Caller, a U.S. right-wing information web site.
Actual America’s Voice, a U.S.-based right-wing streaming channel, claimed the identical day that President Lee Jae Myung issued a directive to bankrupt Coupang. Lee had urged stronger sanctions towards corporations concerned in information breaches, however he didn’t concern such a directive.
The channel additionally shared Issa’s supposition that Korea’s regulation of Coupang and different U.S. tech corporations led to the cancellation of final Thursday’s closed-door assembly of the Korea-U.S. Free Commerce Settlement Joint Committee, regardless of the Korean authorities’s clarification that the occasion was postponed as a result of either side wanted extra time to debate the small print of the agenda.
In response to the U.S. Senate’s lobbying disclosures, Coupang has spent a minimum of $10 million within the U.S. since August 2021. The corporate additionally donated $1 million to Trump’s second inauguration ceremony in January.
Given the corporate’s aggressive recruitment of lobbyists in Washington, issues are mounting that the U.S. could intensify its stress on Korea to cease the investigation into the corporate.
In response, Korea’s presidential workplace ordered the overseas minister and nationwide safety officers to attend an uncommon ministerial assembly on Christmas Day to debate countermeasures towards Coupang’s information breach.
The International Affairs and Unification Committee can even be a part of the Nationwide Meeting’s joint listening to, scheduled for Dec. 30 and 31, to look at whether or not the Coupang case will have an effect on diplomatic relations with the U.S.
