The government has already announced that it will invest and finance W119 trillion over a period of ten years to compensate farmers and strengthen agricultural competitiveness if the FTA is signed. In the past year that this FTA has been delayed, the market share enjoyed by Korean automobiles and electronic products has fallen, to losses of W26.5 billion. Chile already has FTA's with close to 30 countries, so products from other countries are naturally far less expensive.

If the Assembly does not ratify what would be the country's first such agreement, then we shouldn't even dream of signing similar ones with other nations. If a country like Korea, which depends on exports to propel the economy, is not able to export, then there won't be any jobs or even aid for farm regions. Assembly members need to stop looking at their individual electoral districts and think of the whole of the national interest.

About the bill approving troops for Iraq as well, it's time the Assembly reach a conclusion.

Since Japan's advance party of troops arrived in Iraq, public support for Japan's decision to send troops has turned in favor of the move, and foreign press reports are saying the Japanese public is feeling pride at the sight of their flag flying over desert encampments. U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, speaking to reporters on Friday in Munich, compared Korea's deployment of troops to Iraq to the United States' sending troops to Korea roughly 50 years ago.

Sending troops to Iraq will help that country as it begins to establish a democratic constitution. There are already approximately 20 countries with troops in Iraq. If we do not carry through with our promise to the international community to send troops, our international reputation and the national interest will suffer incalculable damage.