Kim Moon-soo, Han Duck-soo hold 2nd round of talks amid growing time pressure for conservative merger

We start on the local political front as Korea now counts down 26 days to its presidential election on June third.

I have our correspondent Oh Soo-young standing by live on the line with the latest.

Soo-young welcome.

Let's begin with the meeting between conservative candidate Kim Moon-soo and former acting President Han Duck-soo.

That's right.

Kim Moon-soo and Han Duck-soo met at 4:33PM to hold their 2nd round of talks at the National Assembly to discuss forming a joint bid for the presidential election.

In a fashion unprecedented in modern Korean politics,.. the two greeted each other, and seated themselves at an outdoor cafe table for a televised discussion.

But their swapping smiles and small talk have turned into a heated exchange.

As Kim continually raised an issue with Han's late entry to the race, and his remark that he wouldn't run unless a merger was decided before May 11th when candidate registrations close, Han stressed there is no time to lose amid pressing economic and geopolitical issues, and renewed pressure on Kim not to stall the process of joining forces,.. saying their union is the "command of the people."

He reiterated that he'd do all that the party wants for the merger to work, and stressed how Kim had pledged to merge with him at least 22 times in recent weeks.

The PPP has been pushing for its main candidate, Kim, and former PM Han, who is running as an independent, to join forces in the presidential race, against their main opponent the Democratic Party candidate Lee Jae-myung, who currently leads the polls.

Han and Kim have come second and third, respectively, in recent public surveys.

After emerging as the leading PPP candidate in last week's primary, Kim has angrily resisted the party's rush to merge with Han, arguing that he should be the one to set the terms.

Kim on Thursday morning accused the party's elders of "illegal and undemocratic moves" to thwart his candidacy in favour of the former PM, and suggested they campaign separately for a week before a live debate on Wednesday.

He's more or less blamed Han for the lack of outcome from their first round of talks, insinuating the former PM has aligned himself with the PPP leadership.

Han and Kim are continuing their discussion as we speak so I'll keep you updated.

And Soo-young, I hear conflict continues between conservative candidate Kim Moon-soo and the party's leadership?

Yes. The PPP leadership has slammed Kim for his resistance to their roadmap towards joining forces with Han Duck-soo, suggesting a change of the party candidate hasn't been decided, but is technically possible.

While they can't go ahead with a televised debate tonight as planned, as Kim has refused to take part, the party will still conduct a poll on the two candidates from 7 PM tonight until 4 PM on Friday.

Some PPP members, including former presidential contenders, have come to Kim's defence, accusing the leadership of undermining the party's candidacy procedures.

But spokesperson Shin Dong-wook justified the push for a merger, noting 87 percent of PPP members support a Kim-Han union before May 11th.

Senior figures, including floor leader Kwon Seong-dong and former leader Kim Moon-soo, have declared hunger strikes to call for a fast merger.

Meanwhile Soo-young, what's the latest at the liberal camp?

Yes, Lee Jae-myung has been accelerating his economic campaign after the court postponed one of his trials on violating election laws, until after the June 3rd vote.

On Wednesday, Lee met with leaders of Korea's five major business associations, vowing to revive livelihoods through pro-business policies.

Lee is also scheduled to join a live YouTube debate with popular economic influencers, in an apparent bid to appeal to centrists.

Back to you, Sunny.

All right Soo-young, thank you for that coverage.