Seoul protests against Korean president Yoon Suk Yeol: “Barely a single displaced leader” and “unpredictable” anti-communism
DP’s leader Lee Jae-myung openly raised a suspicion as recently as in September. It was dismissed by his office as “brainwashing propaganda”.
The accusations of political attacks have mostly been dismissed as antagonized by the opposition-led parliament.
Dankook University’s Benjamin Engel says, “There’s no other real way to look at it except for a self-coup trying to extend his power” and “push through policies without any sort of negotiations or compromise with the opposition party.”
The Korean Won and stock prices experienced large fluctuations amid uncertainties. Diplomatic and military schedules are being delayed, including a scheduled visit by the Swedish prime minister and a key nuclear deterrence meeting and exercise with the U.S.
But the playbook has not been working so well as of late. Protests demanding his impeachment have been intermittent in Seoul over the past months. The presence of political protests is something that is not new in South Korea, where the protests against the Japanese colonial occupation in 1919 helped to inspire the anti-Japan movement of the 1970s. But it’s not just rote opposition politics — even relatively conservative newspapers are criticizing Yoon, and his popularity is in the toilet. The country was put under martial law by a late night surprise announcement by the leader as he wanted to stop pro-North forces that stole the freedom and happiness of people. The National Assembly, the legislative body that could legally block his martial law order, was suspended.
The White House said it was happy. While Yoon’s change of democratic system throws egg on the face of their trilateral cooperation efforts with the U.S., South Korea and Japan, the politics professor said he wasn’t sure what to think.
To be brief, the conservative President Yoon Suk Yeol is a controversial figure. From the moment he took office he was up to some weird-ass shit, like moving the president’s office out of the historic Blue House. The news cycle was very strange and Yoon had to deny he did so on the advice of shamans. He has been building his power base with anti-feminism and persecution of journalists. Anti-communist fear- mongering is a play that works in a country next to North Korea and is the most important tool in his arsenal.
He has trouble with scandals involving him and his wife. His approval rating has dropped to 20% or below in recent weeks as allegations of Yoon and his wife Kim Keon-hee’s involvement in an influence-peddling scandal emerged.
Lee’s warning against martial law in South Korea prompted by the daughter of the president, Park Geun-hye, during the 2017 presidential election
Nevertheless, after his suspicion became a reality, Lee expressed disbelief. “I felt like I was in a cartoon and Alice was in the picture,” Lee said at the rally. “This country – the 10th biggest economy in the world, a cultural powerhouse and an aspiring 5th biggest military power – was backpedaling to an outdated country.”
In recent years, the main opposition Democratic Party has warned against the possibility that a conservative government can declare martial law to defuse a political crisis. Under President Park Geun-hye, daughter of the dictator Park Chung Hee, the military prepared a detailed plan for martial law amid nationwide protests over her corruption allegations that eventually led to her impeachment in 2017.
The National Assembly’s Secretary General Kim Min-ki said in a briefing that nearly 300 martial law troops stormed the parliament, flying in military helicopters or climbing over fences. He said that the main building had some smashed windows. Kim announced that members of the defense ministry and the police will now be prohibited from entering the parliament, to protect the institution’s functions and lawmakers’ safety.
The parliament’s main gate was occupied by a growing crowd of protesters. Inside the compound, protesters and parliament staffers tried to block soldiers from entering the main meeting hall. Some barricades were made with furniture.
South Korea’s president briefly imposed martial law over the country and now some are calling on him to resign or be impeached.
He accused the opposition-controlled parliament of attempting to overthrow the democratic system through legislative dictatorship. Yoon said that by imposing martial law, his aim was “to crush North Korea-sympathizing anti-state forces and to preserve the free constitutional order.”
A martial-law command soon issued a decree suspending the legislature, blocking all political activities and putting the media under its control. The command threatened violators will be arrested without warrant.
Leaders of the ruling conservative People Power Party and the main liberal opposition Democratic Party both immediately decried Yoon’s action as unconstitutional and illegal.
The U.S. Embassy in South Korea issued an alert, advising U.S. citizens to stay away from protests or other large gatherings, which could escalate into violence. The U.K. also made a similar travel advisory.
It was the first time martial law was imposed in South Korea since the 1980s. Martial law was used in the early decades of the country’s modern history to squash pro-democracy and political opponents because of threats from North Korea.
The South Korean people know their history as well according to Benjamin Reich, a visiting political science professor. “And they’re not going to accept a return of military rule or martial law. And that was clear from the get-go.”
The Up First Newsletter: Changing the French Parliament into a More Responsible, Efficient, Equally Secure, and Protecting Minors from Sexual Exploitation
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The Supreme Court will be weighing in today on the issue of trans children’s rights. At issue is a Tennessee law that blocks minors from accessing gender-affirming care. Within the last three years, over two dozen states have enacted laws that ban puberty blockers, hormones and other treatments for minors who say their gender doesn’t align with their sex at birth.
The French government could fall today as it faces a no-confidence vote brought by the far left and far right. If they get the votes needed to pass in the lower house of parliament, Prime Minister Michel Barnier, who has been in power less than three months, could be ousted. At issue is the 2025 budget, which attempts to address France’s spiraling deficit. Barnier pushed it through parliament this week without holding a vote by using an emergency clause.
Source: South Korea’s president faces calls to be impeached. And, tips to avoid porch pirates
Conserving Christmas Packages: A Season of Peace and Light for the White House and for the Young South Koreans, and Why We Don’t Live in Korea
Retailers and local officials are reminding Americans that they should not be victims of porch pirates, who steal packages from homes. There were more than 120 million stolen packages in the US last year. Here are some steps you can take to protect your packages:
First lady Jill Biden has decked the halls of the White House for the family’s last Christmas of President Biden’s presidency. This year’s decoration is called A Season of Peace and Light. More than 300 volunteers spent the past week decorating the White House’s public spaces and its 83 Christmas trees with nearly 10,000 feet of ribbon, over 28,000 ornaments, more than 2,200 paper doves and around 165,000 lights, according to the Associated Press.
This is, of course, an oversimplification of a body politic that is composed of complex individuals. More importantly, a conservative value set does not necessarily translate to conservative politics. The young men were young during the dictatorship and lived through the student protests and the Gwangju uprising. It’s tempting to cast them in opposition to a younger generation that is less prone to redbaiting. The ahjussis were young when they ushered in a true liberal democracy in South Korea.
I am running through a list of potential writers, but no one is available to write about what is happening in Korea. I do not report on Korean politics, nor do I have enough language proficiency to interview people on the street. Also, I am completely blasted, though maybe not unusually so in Seoul on a weeknight. At dinner, we sat by a group of men with empty bottles of alcohol on their table, and they waved their owner down for more booze. “Wow,” I said, before going on to mix soju bombs for my companions. Korea is sometimes considered the Ireland of East Asia, but when I live in the US the atmosphere of the city changes my drinking habits.
I am taking off my makeup while the president lifts the martial law order. My body is tired, my brain is crazy, and I can barely make sense of what’s happening. It’s too soon to reckon with what happened, or to figure out what happens next. I see the screencaps of Lee Jae-myung livestreaming himself climbing the wall at the National Assembly; I think about the GoPros and livestreamers; I think about the kids asking to have their picture taken, so they can tell their families that they were there on that important day. Politics is easy tointermediate through technology and has become embedded in the fabric of life for both young and old.
Line 1 is almost an internet meme due to the fact that men often get into drunken fights on its trains. A wasted guy is yelling loudly in the car next to him and another man slams the door shut because he didn’t like what he heard. A girl in a collegiate athletic jacket is sleeping. The younger man is exchanging words with a small white-haired man who is ineffectually trying to sway over him, but the older man is barely verbal and is stumbling and swaying.
The energy gets subtly different when I transfer to Line 9. I have never seen Koreans taking phone calls in public. As I get off at the National Assembly stop at 12:30AM, the entire train empties out with me.
When I finally catch a cab, the gray-haired driver asks me if I was at the protests. He thanks me when I answer affirmative. I am embarrassed; my Korean is not good enough to explain to him that I am a journalist, that I am an American, that I am supposed to be an impartial observer of history. The ahjussi goes on to tell me he’s always hated Yoon and complains about being called a commie for saying that Yoon was going to ruin the country. He is listening to some kind of internet livestream commentator as he drives me home; I can see the video feed playing on his phone on top of his GPS map; he clucks and shakes his head and noisily reacts as he listens. He asks me rhetorically about what the elites are doing to stop this situation. I don’t have an answer.
The protest is still going strong at 4AM but I am too cold and too sober to be able to stick it out. A drunk man is being helped by a cop after he gets out of the area, but he isn’t wearing a green vest. He doesn’t seem to have legal problems, he is just too wasted to be able to stand.
A couple of kids ask another protester to please take a photo of them. There is a musical comedy on the street in which a man in a balloon suit is performing. I am nearly sober now, but it doesn’t feel right. At 3AM the loudspeakers play a version of “Auld Lang Syne” with Korean lyrics that I think are political — I don’t know enough Korean to be able to tell. An ahjussi near me belts out the words with feeling. people have taken their phones out and turned on the flashlights to wave them around like lightsticks at a concert
At 1:02AM, the man on the microphone announces that the Assembly has voted to block the declaration of martial law; a heartfelt cheer goes through the crowd. The speakers play an awful song that sounds like it was recorded by a group of children. The crowd sings along; the ahjussis seem to know all the words by heart. The Republic of Korea is a democratic republic, according to the lyrics. The people of the Republic of Korea control the power of the country.
A few minutes later I hear the thunder of helicopters overhead. (The news later reports that military helicopters landed on the other side of the building, carrying soldiers to invade the National Assembly. About an hour before I arrived, the leader of the liberal opposition party livestreamed himself scaling a fence in order to get to the Assembly building to vote.)
There is a decreasing number of riot police. I see a police bus door shut; I catch a glimpse of dozens of neon green vests piled inside its confines. A woman smiles and says, “Go on home!” The New York Times says there are thousands of people on the street when the crowd is getting bigger. I attempt to do a count before I realize I am too buzzed to do it.
An unidentified man gets on a microphone and begins narrating updates; he starts by asking the crowd to surround him and protect him from having the mic taken by the police. The protesters behaved in a way that was orderly.
An Analysis of the Decay of a National Assembly Candidate to Become a Solved Off-Camera
The people are bundled up in coats. I wonder if anyone else can tell how drunk I am and how drunk other people are. Politicians who ran to the National Assembly in order to stop democracy are slurring their words while on television. They appear to have been enjoying their Tuesday night in very much the same fashion I had been.
The sudden vibe shift starts with a middle-aged aunty sitting on a platform bench waiting for the other train who shouts “Fighting!” at the crowd that packs the escalator and the stairs. Another woman in a motorized wheelchair yells political slogans as she zips ahead to the exit, fist in the air. The first thing that comes to my mind when I return to the air is military uniforms. Before taking out my phone, I realized that two men in full body tactical camo looked frightened. The soldiers are surrounded by angry males pushing and cursing at them.
He tried to take power with the help of soldiers, police and helicopter. These are not the 1980s. Cell service should have been seized by him first.
