文대통령 "역대 최대 3차 추경 편성 조속 처리 부탁"...당정, "이달 내 처리"<br /><br />President Moon Jae-in urged the National Assembly to swiftly screen and pass the biggest single supplementary budget proposal in the country's history, stressing the economic fallout caused by COVID-19.<br />The ruling party and the government have agreed on a proposal, expressing hopes to pass the budget by the end of June.<br />Our political correspondent Kim Mok-yeon leads our coverage tonight.<br />President Moon Jae-in has vowed to use South Korea's full fiscal capacity to overcome the COVID-19 crisis,... calling for parliamentary cooperation for the swift passage of a third extra budget.<br />Chairing an emergency economic council session on Monday, Moon said that there must be an economic rebound in the second half of the year, as the South Korean economy contracted 1-point-4 percent on-quarter in the first three months of this year.<br />"The government earmarked an all-time high single extra budget as part of its drastic finance injection policies for the latter half of the year, which will be submitted to the parliament this week.<br />I ask for lawmakers to cooperate in swiftly screening and passing the budget to recover our economy as soon as possible."<br />The ruling Democratic Party and the government vowed to pass the third extra budget by as early as June.<br />"We will work to pass the third budget within the June extraordinary session as soon as we finish finalizing the structure of the 21st National Assembly."<br />Though the exact size of the budget is yet to be announced, it is widely expected to top 24 billion U.S. dollars.<br />It will provide over 8 billion dollars to help small enterprises, and 25 billion dollars to stabilize bond and stock markets.<br />The budget will also be used to create around 550,000 jobs in the digital sector, and to expand the social safety net.<br />The government will also raise the age for free flu shots so that an extra 2.4 million under-18s will be able to get the vaccines.<br />"Once the budget gets passed, the ruling party and the government hope to implement 75 percent of it within three months.<br />The opposition also agreed on the need for a large-scale extra budget, and claimed that it will cooperate if the proposal is deemed reasonable."<br />Kim Mok-yeon, Arirang News.<br />
