What next in South Korea: Expect ‘more upheaval’ expert says
South Korean President Yoon Suk Yoel imposed martial law - for two hours - on the country, with protests and an impeachment following soon after. But what’s next for South Korea?
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In brief:
- South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol declared emergency martial law late Tuesday night, citing threats from "North Korean communist forces," but was swiftly countered by the National Assembly, which unanimously voted to lift the order within two hours.
- South Korean MPs have since initiated impeachment proceedings against President Yoon.
- Karl Friedhoff from the Chicago Council on Global Affairs suggests further upheaval is likely, with the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions planning a general strike, and notes that South Korean civil society has a strong tradition of peaceful protest and successfully challenging political leadership.
What’s the story?
As Emily, Jon and Lewis were wrapping up Tuesday’s podcast recording, unexpected news broke that South Korea’s president Yoon Suk Yeol had declared emergency martial law.
It was 10.30pm in Seoul when he made the televised address, in which he cited the need to protect the country from “North Korean communist forces” and “antistate forces”.
“I remember hearing that and thinking; ‘What on earth is going on?’,” Emily Maitlis says.
On today’s episode of The News Agents we speak to Karl Friedhoff, Marshall M. Bouton Fellow for Asia Studies at the Chicago Council on Global Affairs to make sense of it all.
He calls President Yoon’s language in the address “anachonistic”, saying; “Only the really hardcore right still think that there is a North Korean sympathizer movement within the Progressive Party.”
Ultimately, he adds, it paints Yoon as a leader who is “out of touch” with society.
The world waited and watched on as martial law came into effect - but what happened next proves Friedhoff’s point that South Koreans were generally not on the same page as their leader.
Moments after the address thousands of protestors had gathered at the National Assembly.
Despite it being the middle of the night, 190 of the 300 members of the Assembly arrived (with one reportedly jumping over a barrier to enter) and voted unanimously in favour of lifting it.
In a turn of events, the National Assembly vote led President Yoon to make yet another address, this time reversing the martial law order, roughly just two hours after it was imposed.
Since then, South Korean MPs have begun impeachment proceedings against President Yoon, which will be voted on Friday or Saturday.
“If the impeachment goes through I think he and his wife are going to be in a very bad place once the personal investigations open up into their conduct while in and before office,” Friedhoff remarks.
What can we expect to happen next?
Friedhoff says that while it might have appeared that things died down quite quickly in Seoul yesterday, he is “confident” that there will still be “more upheaval”.
He explains that the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions (KCTU), which has over a million members, has called for a general strike later this week.
“If they hit the streets, especially around the presidential office, you're going to get much more dramatic images than you saw in the previous days.”
Maybe even more significantly, Friedhoff argues that because South Korea is no stranger to overturning presidents - they overthrew a dictator in the 80s and removed a corrupt president only in 2017 - there’s a genuine “cultural belief in South Korean society that you can achieve outcomes through peaceful protest.”
“They've had this experience,” Friedhoff says.
“There's a real belief that civil society and peaceful protest can play a role, and is a vital part of political life.
“One thing about Korean civil society is that once they start a protest, they are very unlikely to give it up until they see results.”