By Yoon Won-sup
Staff Reporter

A majority of South Koreans do not feel uneasy about a planned reduction in U.S. troops here.

According to a survey of 1,000 adults last Friday, 52.6 percent said that they don’t think the pullout of U.S. troops will affect their sense of security. About 47 percent of them, however, expressed a different degree of concern about the U.S. military draw down.

The survey was conducted last week by Media Research Inc. at the request of The Korea Times and its sister paper Hankook Ilbo. Its margin of error is within plus or minus 3.1 percentage points.

By age bracket, the survey showed that the older respondents are, the more concerned they are about the U.S. pullout.

However, 61.3 percent expected that the drop in the number of U.S. soldiers here will lead to a security vacuum of a varying degree. About 37 percent forecast no gap whatsoever.

The United States recently announced its plan of reducing 12,500 soldiers out of the 37,000-strong U.S. Forces Korea (USFK) by the end of 2005.

Regarding Seoul’s plan to send additional troops to Iraq, 57.5 percent of those surveyed said that they object to the plan, while 41.0 percent expressed their support for it. Under the government plan, endorsed by the National Assembly last February, 3,000 soldiers were to head for Iraq. However, the plan has been delayed with no exact departure date set. The ruling Uri Party, which promotes a liberal line of foreign policy, is leading a bipartisan drive to roll back the troop dispatch plan.

Those in their 20s and 30s, in particular, are strongly opposed to the troop dispatch.

Meanwhile, the U.S. was picked as the most serious obstacle to solving the North Korean nuclear crisis. North Korea came in second and China was third. .

At the same time, 64.5 percent of the respondents said that South Korea should place the greatest focus on its alliance with the U.S. on security matters.

About 45.1 percent said the country should put the largest importance on China, with the U.S. coming in second.

yoonwonsup@koreaitmes.co.kr