"Put Sewol Ferry Photo When Korean Players Enter?" Russian Broadcaster Severely Criticizes MBC Broadcast

Russian-born broadcaster Ilya Belyakov criticized MBC.
[Photo by Ilya Belyakov, social networking service (SNS) capture]

[Asia Economy Reporter Seoyoung Kwon] Ilya Belyakov, a broadcaster originally from Russia, criticized MBC for the controversy caused by its broadcast of the 2020 Tokyo Olympics opening ceremony.

Ilya, who gained recognition through JTBC's 'Non-Summit,' shared a captured image of MBC's Olympic opening ceremony broadcast screen on his social media on the 24th. The photo showed MBC introducing the Ukrainian team with an image of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster site attached.

Ilya raised his voice of criticism, saying, "The person in charge who made this subtitle must have thought, 'Oh, this is okay.' When the South Korean athletes entered, why didn’t they include a photo of the Sewol ferry disaster?" and "Why didn’t they include a photo of the 9/11 terror attack for the United States?" He also pointed out, "How ignorant and uninformed must one be to include a photo of an exploded nuclear power plant?"

MBC's Olympic opening ceremony broadcast caused controversy due to inappropriate photo selection.
[Photo by MBC, screenshot of the opening ceremony broadcast]

Earlier, MBC faced controversy for selecting inappropriate images during the broadcast of the opening ceremony, such as showing a Bitcoin image when the El Salvador team entered and inserting photos of protests following the assassination of the president when introducing the Haiti team. Additionally, Norway was criticized for using a salmon image, and Italy for using a pizza image in their country introductions.

There were also criticisms regarding mentions of each country's per capita Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and COVID-19 vaccination rates. Questions arose about the necessity of referring to the economic status of countries unrelated to the sports event. As the controversy grew, MBC issued an apology at the end of the live broadcast, stating, "Inappropriate photos and subtitles were used," but public opinion did not easily subside.

In response, on the 24th, MBC released a statement explaining, "The intention was to briefly and easily introduce the teams entering by country during the opening ceremony." They admitted, "There was a significant lack of consideration and care for the countries involved, and the review process was inadequate." They added, "We recognize the seriousness of this matter and will thoroughly investigate the selection of video materials, subtitle organization, and the entire review process, and take strict follow-up measures based on the results." Furthermore, they pledged, "We will fundamentally reexamine the sports program production system to prevent similar incidents from happening again."