For South Koreans, martial law declaration brought back painful memories
When South Koreans came out to defend democracy in the face of a surprise martial law declaration by their president, history was weighing on their minds.
SEOUL, South Korea — When South Koreans came out to defend democracy this week in the face of a surprise martial law declaration by their president, history was weighing heavily on their minds.
South Korea, a key U.S. ally, is the world’s 10th-largest economy and a vibrant Asian democracy in a region where authoritarianism is on the rise. But the country of 50 million people spent decades under military-authoritarian rule, with martial law frequently declared and those who resisted it sometimes killed.
“I think a lot of people were concerned about what soldiers on duty who were being deployed to implement martial law were going to do,” said Eun A Jo, a postdoctoral fellow at the Dickey Center for International Understanding at Dartmouth College. “And thankfully, this time around, we didn’t see any bloodshed.”
President Yoon Suk Yeol shocked the country Tuesday when he declared emergency martial law in a late-night television address. Lawmakers and members of the public rushed to the National Assembly in the center of the capital, Seoul, where troops were already massing.
“The division that was deployed were the folks who are trained to basically implement some of the hardest tasks vis-a-vis North Korea,” which South Korea technically remains at war with, Jo said. “So I think when they were deployed, they were under the impression that this had something to do with that. But then they ended up at the National Assembly.”
Rating: 5