Sung Kim has a very tough act to follow replacing the popular US Ambassador Kathleen Stephens:

The Barack Obama administration has tapped Sung Kim, the State Department’s top Korea expert, as its new ambassador to South Korea, sources here said Friday.

If his nomination is confirmed by the Senate, Kim, 51, will become the first U.S. ambassador to Seoul with an origin in Korea.

“The U.S. government requested a diplomatic agreement from the South Korean government to the nomination earlier this week,” a source said.

Kim, born in South Korea, immigrated to the U.S. in the 1970s and obtained U.S. citizenship in 1980.

Another source said that the White House took into account Kim’s expertise in Korean affairs. He has served as special envoy for the six-way talks on North Korea’s nuclear programs since 2008.

The career diplomat earlier headed the Office of Korean Affairs at the State Department.  [Korea Times]

This is what I know about Sung Kim, I hear that his ability to translate Korean into English is remarkable.  He has also been working North Korea issues for many years with little success and has been clinging to the policy of denuclearizing North Korea.  I don’t know if he really believes in this policy or not or is just following State Department policy on North Korea, but it has been obvious for years that North Korea is not going to denuclearize.  His track record with North Korea during the Bush administration years was very bad, but has gotten much better during the Obama administration.  Then again this may all be irrelevant because the US ambassador’s primary job is to represent the US in South Korea not work North Korea issues.  So it will be interesting to see how Sung Kim does as the US Ambassador to South Korea, but like I said before he has a tough act to follow.