[3] President Park Chung Hee offered the Korean Muslim Federation land on which to build a proper mosque as a gesture of good will to potential Middle Eastern allies for the still young Republic of Korea.

That number rose again sharply to around one hundred fifty thousand with the large influx of foreign workers from Muslim countries such as Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Indonesia in the 1990s.

A busy commercial area has developed around the mosque, primarily centered around the sale and preparation of Middle Eastern cuisine and other halal food.

[2] While the 2007 South Korean hostage crisis in Afghanistan was underway, Seoul Central Mosque became the location of several anti-Islamic protests by Christian groups and the recipient of various bomb threats, to the point where a significant increase in police presence was deemed necessary to prevent an attack on worshipers or else on the building itself.

The large minarets on the building and the engraved Arabic calligraphy near its entrance are noteworthy in particular as being as out of place among the more standard Korean architecture that makes up the rest of Itaewon.