hankyoreh

South and North Korean athletes make a joint entrance to the Sydney Olympic games in 2000 led by South Korean women’s basketball captain Jung Enun-soon (center right) and North Korean judo captain Park Jong-chol (waving the Korean Peninsula flag.)

International Olympic Committee President Thomas Bach’s arrangement of a four-person meeting in Lausanne, Switzerland, on Jan. 20 with the chairpersons of North and South Korea’s Olympic committees and the head of the 2018 Pyeongchang Olympics organizing committee may be aimed not only at discussing North Korea’s participation in the Pyeongchang Olympics and North and South Korea’s joint entrance to the games but also at ultimately setting up a unified Korean team, a sports website says.

On Jan. 10, Inside the Games, a news website focusing on the Olympics, analyzed the joint proposal submitted by North and South Korea on Jan. 9 and concluded that Bach’s coordination of the four-party meeting is aimed at creating a unified inter-Korean women’s hockey team. Remarking that unified teams had been created for the table tennis and youth football events in the past, the website even provided concrete figures, suggesting that between three and eight North Korean female hockey players could join the South Korean team. The website went on to say that the four-person meeting would discuss not only a combined women’s hockey team but also issues such as marching into the stadium together, the composition of the team of athletes, uniforms and banners.

The South Korean women’s hockey team (ranked 22nd in the world), which qualified to compete in this year’s games by virtue of being from the host country, is part of the B group, which includes four of the eight teams in the event, along with Japan, Switzerland and Sweden. Initially, the team lagged far behind its world-class competitors. But major investment, including a private donation from Chung Mong-won, president of the Korea Ice Hockey Association, helped the men’s hockey team nearly qualify for the Olympics on its own merits, while the women’s hockey team has also made great strides through off-season training with stronger teams.

If a unified team is created, the final game in the group league with Japan on Feb. 14 is likely to keep fans on the edge of their seats. A unified women’s hockey team would also increase the number of North Korean athletes attending the Pyeongchang Olympics.

By Kim Chang-keum, staff reporter

Please direct questions or comments to [english@hani.co.kr]