Acting South Korean President Han Duck-Soo joined CNN to discuss President Trump's tariffs.
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NewsTranscript
00:00If some of the mutually satisfactory agreements can be made,
00:06I think U.S. can adjust their already imposed tariff,
00:12depending on the negotiations between the two countries.
00:16Then clearly the final outcome, I think, would be much better
00:23than one side impose something
00:27and the other side is actually retaliates and things like that.
00:31So we will take a very cooperative position on this
00:34and we will promote the dialogue.
00:37And we have a lot of experience with that kind of, you know,
00:41finding out the mutual benefit between the two countries.
00:46If I may, to be clear, you do anticipate that this 25% tariff level will not stay.
00:53That's your anticipation?
00:55Depending on the negotiations.
00:57That's certainly your hope.
00:58Yes.
00:59Are you optimistic?
01:01How do you feel on a gut level these negotiations are going to go?
01:07Well, now about 57 countries are actually subject to that kind of tariff.
01:1325% though, that's pretty steep for friends for generations.
01:20Well, it's a pity because we are evaluated in that way.
01:25But I think that that kind of different assessment can always happen in this kind of situations.
01:32You think it can always happen even though South Korea and the United States have been friends for generations?
01:39I guess my point is, should friends really be treating friends like this?
01:43Well, friendship should be compensated by sometimes the mutual economic, financial, and other dimensional aspects.
01:57You can never say that relations between the United States and Korea, because we are friends, so everything should be condoned and we don't care what happens.
02:09That kind of situations cannot be sustainable.
02:15Right.
02:15I understand that friends can't be happy with each other all the time.
02:19But I guess, Acting President Han, when you have President Trump calling out South Korea about a month ago at the joint session to Congress,
02:27making space in the joint session to call out South Korea and then slapping a 25% tariff, what was your reaction to that?
02:37Well, for the tough negotiator, you don't have to be, you don't have to have some kind of permanent and prior perception on what the other party is doing.
02:54I think we should, you know, in a very cool way, assess what this kind of 25% means for us, and we should, in a very cool way, should negotiate with them.