Senior Korean diplomat found unconscious with brain bleed in Singapore

One of South Korean President Moon Jae-in’s key staffers has collapsed with an apparent brain bleed while the president and state executives were in Singapore for this year’s annual ASEAN Summit.

Moon broke the news on Friday.  He said Kim Eun-young, the director-general of the South Asia and Pacific Foreign Affairs Bureau, was found unconscious in her hotel suite.  Moon also said she seemed to have suffered a cerebral hemorrhage. “She has been arranging many meetings related to ASEAN and APEC and she must have worked too hard,” Moon said, expressing sorrow. “She was hospitalized in a local hospital and I visited her. She was believed to have high intracranial pressure and remains in a critical condition. She needs to be observed for a day to confirm her condition.”

Moon said his personal doctor was left with Kim while he and Foreign Minister Kang Kyung-wha left for Papua New Guinea for the APEC Summit. He said Kim’s family, including her husband who also works for the ministry, have been notified.

Kim, 48, a graduate of the country’s prestigious Seoul National University, in March became Korea’s first woman elected a regional director-general.

By Ko Dong-hwan

(Korea Times)