Seoul: The US ambassador to South Korea, Mark Lippert, who was slashed on wrist and face in a knife attack in Seoul, has finally been released from the hospital.
Last week on Thursday, Lippert was attacked by a pro-North Korean activist Kim Ki-jong, who lunged at the envoy during a breakfast meeting last, wielding his 10-inch knife at Lippert.
In the moments after the knife attack, video footage showed the ambassador holding his injured cheek with one hand and the other hand bloodied from an injury to the wrist.
Lippert, who has been in Seoul's Severance Hospital since last Thursday, was operated upon by a plastic surgeon and an orthopaedic surgeon.
According to the medics, Lippert had 80 stitches from his face removed and that the pain in his wrist had subsided, the BBC reported.
The doctors said that the knife attack would have been life-threatening if the cuts were deeper.
Though police have not ascertained the assaulter's motive, the 55-year-ol attacker was heard shouting slogans against US-South Korea military drills after the attack.
The attacker has denied charges of attempted murder.
Attack on Lippert saw many South Koreans holding rallies and prayer sessions for him and US-South Korea relations.
President Park, who visited Lippert at the Severance Hospital in Seoul on Monday, had condemned the knife assault as "intolerable", calling it an attack on the South Korea-US military alliance.
