PARIS — Early Saturday, Olympic organizers issued a “deep apology” after mistakenly introducing South Korea’s delegation as being from North Korea during Friday night’s Opening Ceremony.
As a boat carrying dozens of rain-soaked, flag-waving South Korean athletes floated down the Seine River, presenters mistakenly introduced them in French and English as the "Democratic People's Republic of Korea,” the official name of North Korea. This error was corrected later when North Korea’s athletes were introduced correctly.
Tensions between North and South Korea have existed since the division of Korea following World War II. The two nations remain in a military standoff decades after the Cold War.
“We deeply apologize for the mistake that occurred when introducing the Korean athletes during the broadcast of the opening ceremony,” the International Olympic Committee said in Korean in a post on X.
An error occurred in our broadcast when introducing the team of the National Olympic Committee (NOC) of the Republic of Korea during the Opening Ceremony, we apologise sincerely. pic.twitter.com/LfUPLrtaYv
— IOC MEDIA (@iocmedia) July 27, 2024
During a news conference on Saturday, IOC spokesperson Mark Adams described the error as an “operational mistake” and called it “deeply regrettable.”
“We can only apologize, in an evening of so many moving parts, that this mistake was made,” Adams added.
The South Korean sports ministry pledged to lodge "a strong complaint with France on a government level" over the embarrassing mistake. They have requested a meeting with IOC President Thomas Bach to address the incident.
Remarkably, this is not the first time such a mix-up has occurred at the Olympics. In 2012, organizers apologized after South Korea’s flag was displayed beside North Korea’s women’s soccer team on the stadium video board in Glasgow as players warmed up for their opening match. North Korea initially refused to play their match against Colombia, leading to a delay of over an hour.