North Korea requests Korean Asian Canoe Federation executives to rent canoe boat for 2026 Asian Games

(Nagoya = Yonhap News) Reporter Oh Myeong-eon = It was discovered that the North Korean Olympic Committee requested a Korean official to rent a boat for the competition ahead of the canoe event at the 2026 Aichi-Nagoya Asian Games.

According to Yonhap News coverage on the 12th, the sender, who identified himself as an official of the North Korean Olympic Committee, sent an email to Kim Eun-seok, Secretary General of the Korean Canoe Federation, who is also Secretary General of the Asian Canoe Federation (ACF), inquiring about renting two boats for the canoe sprint competition at the Asian Games.

This email, sent in English through a Google account, began with the greeting 'Dear Colleague' instead of specifying the recipient.

Typically, in the canoeing event at the Asian Games, athletes find it inconvenient to bring their own bulky boats, so they often rent them through the local competition organizing committee.

Instead of going to the organizing committee's official channel, North Korea first sent an email to a South Korean national and asked for practical help.

As North Korea is also a member of the ACF and has consistently paid its federation dues through China, it is well aware that the nationality of General Manager Kim, who is in charge of working-level affairs, is Korean.

In the background, it is interpreted that the kites built by North and South Korean canoes on the international stage in the past played a role.

South and North Korea formed a unified team in the women's 500m canoe dragon boat event at the 2018 Asian Games in Jakarta and Palembang, winning the gold medal together for the first time in the history of an international event.

President Kim was a member of the Korea Canoe Federation at the time and was a person who directly interacted with the North Korean canoe team.

The fact that North Korea is participating in the Asian Games held in Japan for the first time also appears to have played a role.

This is the third time that the Summer Asian Games will be held in Japan, following the 1958 Tokyo and 1994 Hiroshima games, but this is the first time North Korea has sent athletes to Japan.

He was not eligible to participate in the Tokyo Games and did not participate in the Hiroshima Games.

In the end, it is interpreted that North Korea, which does not have a good communication network with the local competition organizing committee, tried to smoothly handle the boat rental process based on past ties.

South Korea's current law prohibits individuals from contacting or communicating with North Korea without permission.

Accordingly, instead of sending a reply directly, President Kim relayed North Korea's request to the Asian Games organizing committee as the person in charge of the Asian Canoe Federation, and the organizing committee accepted the request and decided to rent a boat.

Canoeing is largely divided into sprint, which competes for speed in calm water, and slalom, which involves wading through rapids.

The boats requested by North Korea are two boats from a Polish plastics manufacturer to be used in sprint races.

According to the official Asian Games information site, there are three female North Korean athletes who have registered to compete in the canoe sprint event: Cha Eun-young (25), Jeong Ye-sung (26), and Eom Jin-kyung (23).

Among them, Cha Eun-young and Jeong Ye-seong participated as players on the joint North and South Korean team at the 2018 Jakarta-Palembang Games and won a gold medal together with Korean players.