Foreign Ministry confers 1st Lee Tae-seok Award

Lee Jae-hoon, a South Korean volunteer doctor in Madagascar, received the Foreign Ministry’s first “Lee Tae-seok Award,” the ministry said.

Late Catholic priest Lee Tae-seok was known to the Korean public after a KBS documentary “Don’t Cry for Me Sudan” featured his volunteer work in a remote area in Sudan.

The Foreign Ministry has been giving an “Overseas Volunteer Award” every year since 2006 but the new Lee Tae-seok Award recognizes volunteers who work for people in sub-Saharan Africa where volunteering is extremely difficult.

“We founded this new award to commemorate late father Lee Tae-seok’s volunteering spirit and raise the public awareness of development cooperation,” the official said.

According to the ministry, Lee Jae-hoon regularly visits remote areas in Madagascar where 20,000 villagers do not have medical facilities.

Called “Bushman doctor” by locals, Lee does operations for people with tumors, cleft lips and other conditions.

“It is a tropical area and Lee walks for four days to enter a wild village,” the official said.

Lee was picked from more than 50 candidates, who were recommended by officials at overseas diplomatic offices and NGOs. In the final round, he was strongly recommended by late father Lee’s brother Lee Tae-yeong, who said the doctor’s work most resembled that of his late brother.

Foreign Minister Kim Sung-hwan will confer the award to Lee on Wednesday afternoon.

By Kim Yoon-mi (yoonmi@heraldcorp.com)