t accord with the United States that has sparked fears of mad cow disease and sent his popularity plummeting in his first months in office. Lee's words were aimed at calming public anger over the April 18 deal. It does not affect the terms of the agreement, which calls for Seoul to resume full-scale imports of American beef for the first time in more than four years.
He said the government should have tried harder to seek the public's understanding of the deal before going forward.
"The government lacked efforts to seek sufficient understanding and collect opinions from the people," Lee said during a nationally televised address. "I humbly accept the point that the government neglected to fathom the people's mind. I feel sorry."
The beef accord has come under heavy criticism for allegedly failing to protect South Koreans against mad cow disease. The deal calls for Seoul to scrap nearly all restrictions that the country, under Lee's predecessor, imposed on American beef over mad cow concerns.
Lee has defended the deal as being based on scientific grounds, repeatedly assuring the public that U.S. beef is safe.
Still, those efforts failed to stop the spread of mad cow worries among South Koreans, fanned in large part by some sensational media reports. Thousands of people have held a series of candlelight vigils in recent weeks urging the government to scrap the deal.
Lee's popularity has plummeted. A newspaper survey last week showed he had only 22.6 percent of support - a rare phenomenon for a leader who took office less than three months ago. The poll, commissioned by the Naeil Shinmoon newspaper, had a margin of error of plus or minus 3.5 percentage points.
Lee also renewed his pledge to put foremost priority on protecting people's health, and urged the National Assembly to pass a free trade agreement with the United Sates before its term expires next week.
The trade accord, struck last year, awaits legislative approval in both countries. South Korea's main opposition party is reluctant to ratify the agreement amid public criticism of the beef deal.
South Korea suspended imports of U.S. beef after the first American case of mad cow disease appeared in December 2003 in a Canadian-born cow in Washington state.
Restricted imports of U.S. beef reached South Korean supermarkets last year but further shipments were put on hold in October after banned parts, such as bones, were found in a shipment.
Fueling fears was a popular current affairs TV program that claimed Koreans are more susceptible than Americans and Europeans to contracting a rare sickness that can result from eating beef tainted with mad cow disease. The government dismissed the claim.
One key point of opposition to the beef deal is that it does not allow Seoul to suspend imports even if there is a new outbreak of mad cow disease in the U.S. unless the Paris-based World Organization for Animal Health downgrades its safety rating for American cattle.
Seoul officials said this week, however, that Washington recognized Seoul's right to suspend imports under international trade rules.
Another point of contention has been that Seoul agreed to import beef from cattle aged 30 months or older, considered more vulnerable to the disease. The government has failed to address the issue, only saying the beef of older cattle is safe as long as parts prone to the disease are removed.
Scientists believe mad cow disease, or bovine spongiform encephalopathy, spreads when farmers feed cattle recycled meat and bones from infected animals. In humans, eating meat products contaminated with the illness is linked to variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease, a rare and fatal malady.
