Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy cancels all external schedules

[Anchor]

The industrial sector, facing numerous pressing issues, is closely monitoring the situation.

The Minister of Trade, Industry and Energy has canceled all external schedules after assessing the impact on the industry, and companies are also on high alert, holding executive meetings.

Reporter Kim Ji-sook has the story.

[Report]

Last night (Dec. 3), shortly after the declaration of martial law, the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy held an emergency meeting chaired by the minister to assess the economic and industrial impacts and energy supply.

All ministerial events scheduled for today (Dec. 4), including those related to energy and foreign investment, have been canceled.

Instead, the meetings to assess the industrial and energy sectors were chaired by the first and second vice ministers, but there are concerns about disruptions to major ongoing projects.

Currently, a drilling ship heading towards Busan Port from the South China Sea is expected to arrive at Busan Port early next week, but it has encountered budget issues, and the semiconductor cluster project being developed in the southern Gyeonggi Province is facing similar challenges.

The business community is also on high alert.

Many companies have already entered emergency management due to sluggish domestic demand and external variables such as the U.S.'s tariff announcements and US-China conflicts ahead of Trump's second term. Now, the difficulty has deepened due to increased domestic uncertainties.

As a result, major conglomerates like Samsung, SK, and LG are analyzing the impact of the current situation and preparing countermeasures.

[Kim Dae-wook/Professor of Economics, Soongsil University: "(In the U.S. and elsewhere) protectionist measures are creating various difficulties, and there is an unpredictable uncertainty. South Korea is politically very unstable, and that is a factor that cannot help but affect the economy...."]

Meanwhile, regarding the connection issues on some portals immediately after the announcement of martial law, the Ministry of Science and ICT stated that there were no network failures other than temporary service disruptions due to a surge in connection volume.

This is KBS News, Kim Ji-sook.