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Report
Yoon 'created the rhetoric of a national security crisis' in South Korea, analyst says
FRANCE 24 English
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12/3/2024
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00:00
To discuss what's happening in South Korea, let's bring in Katherine Moon,
00:03
Professor of Political Science and the Wasserman Chair of Asian Studies at Wellesley College in
00:10
the US. Thank you so much for being with us this evening. So why did all of this
00:15
come to a head when it did? How exactly did we get here?
00:22
Well, we don't know why President Moon declared martial law out of the blue. South Koreans
00:29
are wondering, as is the rest of the world. What we do know, those of us who follow Korea
00:37
developments, is that he has been a very, very unpopular leader with lower than 20%
00:46
favorability ratings, and that he has been overwhelmed with both the National Assembly
00:54
as well as media attention and pressure on his wife's alleged bribery and corruption scandals.
01:04
And he has been hamstrung. He has not been able to do much of what he wanted to do in terms of
01:09
his legislative agenda because he has absolutely no control over the National Assembly, with the
01:15
opposition party having a majority there. They came in by a landslide in the spring, and that
01:22
is a sign that the South Korean public is very unhappy about President Moon.
01:30
I think what's interesting is that this martial law only lasted two and a half hours,
01:37
and that, ironically, the two parties, the conservative party that is part of Mr. Moon's
01:46
leading camp, and the opposition Democratic Party, the leaders of those two parties came
01:51
together in the National Assembly to vote down this martial law declaration and condemn it as
01:58
unconstitutional and illegal. So, Catherine, is the crisis essentially over then? What exactly
02:04
happens now? Well, I think the South Korean public is already calling for impeachment and arrest,
02:15
and I think the National Assembly will also take measures for impeachment. There will be a lot of
02:21
pressure on him to resign, and he will have to be held accountable because he claimed that there
02:28
were anti-state, pro-North Korea forces at work, and that was his justification for declaring martial
02:37
law. But absolutely, there is no indication that there was any unusual activity by the North
02:42
Koreans. And when he came on television just a little while ago to announce that martial law
02:50
is now over, he had nothing to say about having defeated the forces that he had originally claimed
02:59
he wanted to tackle. So, it's really a real question mark why he went and took this route
03:06
in the first place. It seems to have signalled his own downfall, if anything. And people also
03:13
question whether or not he was even within his rights to impose martial law, because under the
03:18
constitution he can only do so during war, war-like situations or during a national emergency. Did any
03:25
of this fall under those conditions? No, absolutely not. There was no national emergency. He basically
03:34
created the rhetoric of some kind of a national security crisis, but it's not based in any fact.
03:43
And so, the Korean public, constitutional scholars in South Korea have already been voicing their
03:51
opinion that this was unconstitutional, illegal, that it never should have happened. And he also
03:57
followed no procedure in taking this step. Just simply, he announced it on television in the
04:04
middle of the night. So, I think there will be legal repercussions for him. And I think the Korean
04:12
public will be very vigilantly watching to see what kind of accountability takes place in the
04:20
next few days and weeks. And as for the political fallout, what do you expect there domestically and
04:26
internationally? Well, domestically, I think there's going to be a lot of public attention to this
04:34
and calls for resignation, impeachment, etc. I think that the public also will give credit to
04:44
the two parties, the ruling conservative party and the opposition democratic party for having
04:52
worked together for the first time in a very long time, worked together to restore democracy,
04:59
to restore the rule of law, civilian rule. I think internationally, it really throws a wrench
05:06
into Korea's political economic life. As soon as he declared this martial law at night, last night,
05:20
the Korean currency, the won, fell in value to a two-year low. And this is also a very
05:30
precarious time, as we all know, with wars in the Middle East, in Russia, Eastern Europe,
05:37
and South Korea is a strong partner of the United States and Ukraine, supporting the U.S.
05:46
intentions to support Ukraine. And there shouldn't have been this kind of a disruption,
05:54
and definitely not something that could signal to North Korea that South Korean domestic politics
06:01
is unstable. But Yoon actually, I think, has shot himself in the foot, and that's putting it mildly.
06:07
Catherine, we'll have to leave it there for now. But thank you so much for joining us on
06:11
the programme. That is Catherine Moon, Professor of Political Science. Well, the declaration came...
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