300 detained South Korean workers set to be released: Seoul

SEOUL/WASHINGTON — Seoul said on Sunday that negotiations with the United States to secure the release of South Korean workers detained in an immigration raid have been concluded and they would soon be freed.

It follows the arrest of more than 300 South Korean workers at a Hyundai-LG battery plant being built in the southern US state of Georgia on Thursday.

The operation, carried out in the town of Ellabell, was the largest single-site raid implemented so far under US President Donald Trump's nationwide anti-migrant drive, catching Seoul officials off guard.

"As a result of the swift and united response … negotiations for the release of the detained workers have been concluded," Kang Hoonsik, chief of staff to President Lee Jae-myung, said on Sunday.

"Only administrative procedures remain. Once these are completed, a chartered flight will depart to bring our citizens home," he added.

Footage of the raid released by US authorities showed detained workers, in handcuffs and with chains around their ankles, being loaded onto an inmate transportation bus.

Scrambling to contain the fallout, a senior executive at electric vehicle battery maker LG Energy Solution flew to Georgia on Sunday morning.

"The immediate priority now is the swift release of both our LG Energy Solution employees and those of our partner firms," executive Kim Ki-soo told reporters before boarding a plane.

LG Energy Solution has said 47 of its employees had been arrested — 46 South Koreans and one Indonesian. The company has also said that about 250 of those arrested were believed to be employed by its contractor, and most of them were South Koreans.

An official at a partner firm of LG Energy Solution who spoke with one of the detained workers told Yonhap news agency that conditions at the detention center were poor.

The battery maker said it has suspended all business trips to the United States, except for client meetings, and instructed those already there to either "return immediately or stand by at their accommodations".

Hyundai has said none of those arrested are its employees.

South Korea, Asia's fourth-biggest economy, is a key automaker and electronics producer with multiple plants in the US.

Its companies have invested billions of dollars to build factories in the US in a bid to access the US market and avoid tariff threats from the Trump administration.

Agencies via Xinhua