Yahoo Sports Korean Table Tennis Rivals in Selfie Praised as ‘True Spirit’ of Olympics
South Korean table tennis Olympian Lim Jong-hoon pulled out his phone on Tuesday evening to snap a selfie with his North Korean rivals—the rare moment of unity between the two Koreas immediately went viral.
South Korean mixed table tennis bronze medal winners Lim and Shin Yubin, North Korea’s Ri Jong Sik and Kim Kum Yong, who won silver, and the gold medallist Chinese team Wang Chuqin and Sun Yingsha smiled together as Lim snapped the photo.
The two Koreas, which competed as one team in many events at the 2018 PyeongChang Winter Olympics, the 2000 Sydney Summer Olympics, the 2004 Athens Summer Olympics, and the 2006 Turin Winter Olympics, went their separate ways this year.
The two Korean teams and the Chinese pose for a selfie.
But the selfie was celebrated as a moment of unification and peace in Korean media.
“I congratulated [the North Korean team] when they were introduced as Silver medalists,” Lim told Korean news outlets, according to AFP.
“This is the true spirit of the Olympics,” a South Korean broadcaster said of the moment, according to AFP.
The moment was also celebrated on Chinese social media.
“This is probably the most meaningful image of this Olympics,” a viral post on the Chinese social media site Weibo read, with an image of the three teams taking a selfie attached.
Another joked that “as expected, the original intention of the Olympics is to stop war. Congratulations to another Korean guy who is exempted from military service,” referring to Lim, who avoided the South Korean draft, being an Olympic athlete.
South Korean gymnast Lee Eun-Ju and North Korean gymnast Hong Un-Jong similarly went viral in 2016 when Lee snapped a selfie of the two together at the Rio Olympics.
Lee Eun-Ju of South Korea takes a selfie picture with Hong Un Jong of North Korea.
The selfie comes as North Korea’s Supreme Leader Kim Jong-un said in January that he believed South Korea was no longer a “partner of reconciliation and reunification,” adding “we don’t want war, but we have no intention of avoiding it,” according to Time.
Tensions have also been high at the Olympics, with announcers mistakenly introducing the South Korean athletes as North Korean during July 26’s opening ceremony. The North Korean team was also referred to as the “People’s Democratic Republic of Korea,” instead of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, according to CNN.
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