Burton’s call offers a rare glimpse of pro-Korean sentiment in a Congress whose prominent voices have recently expressed open distrust and anger at Seoul, with International Relations Committee chairman Henry Hyde and East Asia and Pacific Subcommittee chairman Jim Leach in the forefront.

Burton reminded lawmakers that South Korea has been pulling its weight in the alliance 55-years after the Korean War, a point he said was all too often forgotten.

Korea was the seventh largest market for U.S. exports, the fifth largest market for U.S. agricultural goods, a leading free-trade-agreement (FTA) candidate, the third largest contributor of troops to Iraq behind the U.S. and Great Britain, and a nation that has been active on North Korean human rights by accepting some 7,000 defectors from the Stalinist country, Burton wrote. It was also a U.S. military ally where 33,000 U.S. troops are stationed and a friend that has fought on the American side in all four major conflicts it fought since the Korean War, and a major success story of post-World War II U.S. foreign policy, he added.

Burton called the U.S.-South Korea bilateral relationship to be one of America's “most vital and vibrant" partnerships, politically, militarily and economically, and said Seoul remained one of America's most important strategic partners in East Asia. He said the U.S. must realize that Korea is a necessary and indispensable partner in promoting democracy and the free-market economy.

The letter sent by Burton, who serves his 12th term, was a "Dear Colleague Letter" often used to get lawmakers' attention on particular matters and sent to all 435 lawmakers in the lower house.

(englishnews@chosun.com )