President Yoon indefinitely suspends routine Q&A with reporters

President Yoon Suk-yeol answers reporters' questions while arriving for work at the presidential office in Seoul on Nov. 18, 2022. [YONHAP]

President Yoon Suk-yeol will stop holding routine Q&A sessions with the press starting Monday, his office said, after a reporter got into a shouting match with one of his aides during Friday's session.

Doorstepping the president as he arrives for work has become a Yoon hallmark and given reporters unprecedented access to the president in his first six months in office.

The sessions have sometimes led to criticism of Yoon's unfiltered remarks and even been blamed for a decline in his approval ratings.

"The presidential office has decided to suspend doorstepping as of Nov. 21," it said in a notice to the press. "We decided that it could not be continued without fundamental measures to prevent a recurrence of the recent unsavory incident."

"Doorstepping was conceived for open communication with the people," it added. "We will consider resuming it if measures are drawn up to properly fulfill that purpose."

Yonhap