South Korea’s Yoo Myung-hee has withdrawn her candidacy from the World Trade Organisation (WTO) Director-General’s race, according to Washington Trade Daily

Yoo, Korea’s Minister of Trade was contending with Nigeria’s former Finance Minister, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala for the top job at the WTO.

Okonjo-Iweala had last month secured a popular vote by a wide margin but was not named DG because the United States did not support her candidacy.

Washington Trade Daily quoted some sources as saying that South Korea has informed America of its decision and is expected to make it public “in the coming days”.

“Yoo from Korea failed to receive enough support from members of all levels of development -1e., the developed, developing and least developing countries, as well as geographically in comparison to the “largest” support received by Ms Okonjo-Iweala,” the report claimed.