A senior official in South Korea ’s new government was in hot water on Wednesday after apparently endorsing conversion therapy while trying to apologise for previously comparing homosexuality to mental illness. South Korea’s conservative President Yoon Suk-yeol, who was sworn in on Tuesday, is an avowed antifeminist who on the campaign trail promised to abolish the Ministry of Gender Equality. His newly-appointed religion and multicultural secretary, Kim Seong-hoi, was forced to apologise this week over a 2019 Facebook post in which he said homosexuality is “a type of mental illness”. But his apology caused further outrage, as he appeared to endorse controversial – and widely debunked – gay conversion therapy. South Korean women throw down gauntlet to ‘anti-feminist’ president “Some people have innate homosexual tendencies, but in many cases, I think people mistake their learned habits as their natural qualities,” he wrote. “In such cases, I think homosexuality can be changed by receiving certain treatments, just like how smokers receive smoking cessation treatment.” Same-sex marriage is not legal in South Korea, although gay relationships are not criminalised, with LGBT people tending to live largely under the radar. Activists condemned Kim’s remarks and called for him to resign, saying President Yoon should also apologise. “It has already been confirmed that the so-called conversion therapy is unscientific and goes against international human rights law,” campaign group Rainbow Action Against Sexual Minority Discrimination of Korea said in a statement. “As a person who declared his duty to comply with the constitution, how will Yoon take responsibility for the situation in which sexual minorities are insulted within the first two days of his term?” South Korea’s top court overturns two soldiers’ conviction for gay sex Nearly a quarter of South Korea’s population of 51 million are Christian and the religious community holds significant political sway, with many evangelicals opposing gay rights. More than a dozen attempts to pass broad anti-discrimination laws have failed over the past 15 years in the face of strong opposition from conservative churches and civic groups. On the campaign trail, Yoon said “public consensus” was needed to implement an anti-discrimination law.