British Scouts to withdraw from World Scout Jamboree

Scouts attending the 25th World Scout Jamboree take shelter in the shade on Friday, when the local mercury hit 34 degrees Celsius (93.2 degrees Fahrenheit). [NEWS1]

British participants at the 25th World Scout Jamboree being held in North Jeolla will leave the event site for hotels in Seoul, Scouts UK said Friday night.

Their withdrawal comes amid an extreme heatwave that has sickened hundreds of participants and left the Korean government scrambling to provide relief and shelter to 43,000 Scouts, scoutsmasters and event staff from 159 countries assembled at the Jamboree site in Saemangeum, a reclaimed estuarine tidal flat with little shade in Buan County, North Jeolla.

“UK Scouts are transferring our young people and adult volunteers from the World Scout Jamboree site to Seoul over the next two days to alleviate pressure on the site,” the British Scout organization said in statement released on its official website.

Scouts UK also said that British participants at the Jamboree site will be moved to hotel accommodation in the capital, and that the organization will work with Korean authorities “on a program of activities so our young people still get the most from their time in Korea.”

A spokesperson from the British Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office told the Korea JoongAng Daily on Friday evening that they had received word of the organization’s decision and said that the British Embassy in Korea “remains in close contact with Scouts UK and will continue to provide support where required.”

The British Scout delegation is the first to officially leave the World Scout Jamboree site, where over 130 Scouts have been hospitalized with symptoms of heat exhaustion, such as nausea and dizziness.

British Scouts are also the largest foreign contingent participating in the Jamboree, counting over 4,000 participants.

The British Scout delegation is scheduled to depart Korea on Aug. 13, the day after the event concludes.

The delegation’s decision was also reported by the World Organization of the Scout Movement (WOSM) in a statement issued Friday night.

“We have been informed that the Contingent from the United Kingdom has decided to depart from the Jamboree campsite early, allowing Scouts to continue their Jamboree expreience in Seoul until they are scheduled to travel home,” the organization said.

WOSM also said in its statement that it had asked the Korean Scouting Organization, which is hosting the Jamboree, to “consider alternative options to end the event earlier than scheduled and support the participants until they depart for their home countries.”

According to the WOSM, the Korean Scouting Organization “decided to go ahead with the event, assuring that they will do everything possible to address the issues caused by the heat wave by adding additional resources.”

The international body called on the Korean government to “honor their commitments to mobilize additional financial and human resources, and to make the health and safety of the participants their top priority.”

Most of the Scouts at the Jamboree, which is often described as the world’s largest youth camp, are between the ages of 14 and 18.

This is the first Jamboree to take place since the pandemic.

But it also kicked off during the hottest period of the year in Korea, with some parts of the country seeing temperatures above 38 degrees Celsius (100 degrees Fahrenheit) this week.

On Friday, the mercury at Saemangeum hit 34 degrees Celsius, but humidity made it feel closer to 40 degrees Celsius.

The previous day, 1,486 Jamboree participants were said to have sought assistance at the on-site makeshift hospital for a variety of heat-related symptoms and other ailments, including insect bites and skin rashes.

In response to the snowballing health and safety crisis at the event, President Yoon Suk Yeol on Friday directed the government to supply “unlimited” air-conditioned buses and refrigerator trucks to the Jamboree to provide shelter to heat-stricken participants at the event.

Prime Minister Han Duck-soo offered additional assurances at a press conference held at Saemangeum on Friday late afternoon, saying that “the government will use all resources to ensure the Jamboree can end safely amid the heatwave.”

The official order to send aid came after the Jamboree had already made headlines for reports of unsafe conditions and lack of preparation for the sweltering weather.

In addition to the lack of respite, several Scouts and their parents have shared photos of dire conditions on the ground with local media, with some describing instances of being served spoiled eggs for breakfast, lacking adequate soap and toilet paper, dealing with clogged sewage and showers, having to camp on muddy grounds and enduring the heat wave without fans, let alone air conditioning, in most areas of the Jamboree site.

BY MICHAEL LEE [lee.junhyuk@joongang.co.kr]