After Yoon’s statement the military said activities by parliament and political parties would be banned, and that media and publishers would be under the control of the martial law command.
Yoon did not cite any specific threat from the nuclear-armed North, instead focusing on his domestic political opponents. It is the first time since 1980 that martial law has been declared in South Korea.
That’s uh pretty explicit. Not quoted are two other key facts;
- In South Korean law parliament can end Martial Law with a simple majority vote.
- They did that vote immediately.
- The Army “attempted” to take the parliament building but was rebuffed by staff members and fire extinguishers.
Y’all, those soldiers were not on board with this idea. And this is all vitally important because South Korea was a dictatorship for most of the cold war. This is absolutely an attempt to reinstate that.
*Kim Chonk Un calls Xi Jinping to secure a bulk deal on military-grade fire extinguishers*
How would that vote be held if the original Martial Law declaration banned Parliament from meeting? It seems like a gigantic loophole they need to close immediately before the president or a successor tries this again.
Banning them, even under Martial Law is illegal.
Update via Reuters: the president says he’ll abide by the parliament’s decision and revoke his declaration. Nobody started obeying it anyway - the military tried to do something because they had orders, but was not enthusiastic enough to achieve anything.
Some analysis via the Guardian:
Yoon’s declaration of martial law appears to have been a desperate gamble in the face of rock-bottom public popularity – with positive ratings barely over 10% – in the midst of a doctors’ strike and staunch political opposition, increasingly including his own People Power party, whose leader, Han Dong-hoon, said the declaration of martial law was a “wrong move”.
Yoon may have thought that his nostalgia for authoritarianism would resonate with at least some of the South Korean political spectrum, but the unanimous vote in the national assembly to overturn his declaration, including by his own party, suggests he miscalculated.
Dude broke the first three laws of Couping. Control the lawmakers, control the core of the military, control the media. Win these and you control the narrative.
So it was just a little try to get his country back to a dictatorship (with him at the top) because he was too unpopular.
There really should be laws that one must be psychically healthy to be parliament or president.
Yoon cited a motion by the country’s opposition Democratic Party, which has a majority in parliament, this week to impeach some of the country’s top prosecutors and its rejection of a government budget proposal.
They declared martial law over a budget proposal??
I’ve got to start reading Korean news
My god they are so efficient. Whole thing lasted like 3 hours
Under martial law parliament is suspended so the vote was symbolic
Not exactly, under the constitution if the parliament votes to suspend martial law the president must end it. A constitutional crisis is brewing
Technically it might be, but all political power stems from the people agreeing to be governed. If they aren’t represented, they won’t agree to be governed for long.
Basically, the parliament can’t afford to let itself be suspended. It’s needed because the president is going to get dismissed after this kind of behaviour.
So, the following is a genuine question and not a snide remark.
Does that matter? Is the military going to respect that? I’d heard prior to this that the military had forbade parliament from gathering. What’s to say they don’t just side with Yoon?Certainly wouldn’t be the first time in history that a nation’s military has dictated the corse of the nation’s civil future. I really hate asking questions like this but I’m just not familiar enough with the politics of South Korea to know if this a done and dusted thing or if the military is likely to go for a coup if Yoon pitches it.
Apparently, yes, they respected it.
EDIT: Aaand they’re not gone.
God, I was just breathing a sigh of relief till this poped up a moment later.
The South Korean military says it will maintain martial law until it is lifted by President Yoon Suk Yeol, despite the nation’s parliament voting to block its enforcement, according to the country’s national broadcaster.
Hope that’s just postureing.
Ooh, not great. Preview of the US in January? Except for the blocking part, that’d never happen.
Nah, even if evidence appeared at this stage showing the election was interfered with here, the damage is done, there would be no attempt to keep office. The S.C. would rule the period for recounting the votes has passed, precedent being 2000 Florida.
True, but I was referring to when Trump declares martial law, as he said he would. There will be no opposition from his own party as there was here.
Hopefully half heartedly because I just found a live feed of people in the streets in Seoul. So they aren’t exactly enforcing martial law yet.
Who’s not gone, the military or the representatives
Military. They said they’re not leaving until the president stops declaring martial law.
Hopefully they’re not actually doing anything though, just standing around until it’s resolved.
That’s how it seems so far. Hoping this doesn’t end badly for South Korea. The last thing we need is another dictatorship in the world.
Well then democracy has fallen in that country. That blows
Not just yet, but it’s dangerously close.
A clean vote, that’s good.
Yes. This possibility has been discussed for months now. Yoon framed the cuts to his proposed budget as an “act of sympathy to the North” in his speech.
Going full fascist to enforce austerity.
Maybe, keep in mind that reporting is going off the information they have. It might be deeper than that. Only time will tell.
Who had south Korea becoming a fascist state?
Do I hear bingo from the back?
I’ll be honest I had South Korean oligarch class does ridiculous cult shit and causes headlines. Does that count?
Close enough I will allow it 😁
Who had south Korea becoming a fascist state?
I don’t read or speak Korean but maybe the president ran on making South Korea
GreatFascist Again? South Korea only democratized in 1987.The
rat racesquid game eventually ends, as it’s not sustainable.
Yoon said he had no choice but to resort to such a measure in order to safeguard free and constitutional order, saying opposition parties have taken hostage of the parliamentary process to throw the country into a crisis.
Not very familiar with the political situation in Seoul, but saying your political opponents are supporting North Korea sounds like a pretty serious accusation.
Basically, anyone who does not agree with him now is being labelled a North Korea sympathizer
Taking inspiration from Netanyahu I see.
Standard authoritarian playbook, disgusting
I must say, this is a welcome change from the old antisemitism accusation. Now I have two cards in my hand.
If you disagree, you’re a North Semitic antikorean. No wait.
Or from USA, everyone they don’t like is a russian asset
We just don’t get it, he is removing freedom to protect freedom… It’s simple… /s
Yoon cited a motion by the country’s opposition Democratic Party, which has a majority in parliament, this week to impeach some of the country’s top prosecutors and its rejection of a government budget proposal.
Imagine declaring martial law, and these were the only concrete reasons you could come up with.
Donald Trump: hold my steak.
Hamberder
And covfefe
Hamberder
Is Martial law ever declared in a non-corrupt, power-grabbing way?
Canada invoked the Emergencies Act in 2022 when the national capital was occupied by a convoy of antivaxers who shut down the city for days. There was some debate as to whether it was necessary and there was an inquiry afterward. The main reason for invoking it was to allow the federal government to use law enforcement since the Ottawa municipal police mostly sat on its hands during the whole debacle.
Also in Canada, the War Measures Act was used during the FLQ Crisis in 1970. While some may disagree with using martial law, I don’t think many would say it was used in a corrupt, power-grabbing way.
As a Canadian, I can assure you everyone on the right considered it a corrupt, powergrab. Whether or not you agree is of course up to you, but it’s not a clear sky case
Of course everyone on the right didn’t like it, because “Fuck Trudeau” is the extent of their political understanding. It was overkill in hindsight, but in the moment, with the capital paralyzed and armed terrorists in Coutts, some benefit of the doubt must be given.
but they’ll say that no matter what won’t they? Like the only way to convince the right something is not a powergrab is to let them have their way.
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Occasionally in response to things like floods and other disasters. Though then it’s usually local and short lived.
After reading the article it definitely sounds like power-grabbing, but I don’t know much about the Korean Democratic Party so I’m not sure
I read he is blocking the National Assembly building to avoid the martial law being lifted; both parties, including his, will vote to lift it should they get inside
Seems sketchy.
In response to full civil war rebellion. This is not that.
We really are in WW3 we just haven’t noticed it fully yet.
We’re nearly at the end of the" Lead up to World War Three" chapter.
“Rising economic and social tensions in the West” heading on wikipedia
Yup.
I can’t remember when I came to the realization, but for years now I thought that if (and I would love to hold on to the naive hope that it is an “if”) WW3 breaks out then the battle lines would be drawn between the forces of autocracy and democracy. Those would be our sides.
Now, I’m not even sure democracy is gonna make it out the gate… America’s elected a dictator who’s aligned with Russia who is itself a major factor of this unholy autocratic alliance with China, North Korea, and Iran… Now this?
There were no “good guys” in world war 1. It was the result of squabbleing European powers not realizing the destructive potential modern military technology had and how much that changed the game. It needed to happen in the sense that countries couldn’t continue to act the way they had prior to the great war, but that doesn’t mean anyone was in the right.
It’s hard to imagine “good guys” in world war 3 either. Increasingly, it kinda just seems like it’s a choice between “what shit flavor of authoritarianism do you hate less?”. Assuming that question even matters considered all the nuclear weapons that could fly in a third world war.
I dunno man, shit’s just looking pretty fucking bleak.
We are still mostly in the stage where it might be diplomatically avoided, but if it does start, yes, this will have been a small part of the start of it. Like the last couple of decades to varying degrees at various points. It’s still potentially avoidable, but honestly, in some places, it feels like it has already been going for a long time. Currently, they don’t count as part of a world war, but if a world war breaks out, they will then retroactively count as part of it. If everything settles down before getting to that point, then these will have been individual events that were largely connected to a similar crisis.
It’s not like anyone knew at the time what day world war 1 and 2 started on the days we now consider them to have officially started. For world war 1, there was really no precedent. So they certainly would have had no idea on the day we consider it to have started. Used to take months to even find out 2 other countries were at war, let alone the time it took to them react to that information and muster up support or further opposition. World wars only really became possible once world-wide near instantaneous communication was available. I’m not sure how long it even took to coin the phrase “world war”, but they figured that would be the only time something like that would ever happen, considering not only the cost/rammifications, but how widespread word of how bad it was could be with such quick communication.
No one would soon forget the various costs… but then we had a source of motivation that outgrew those costs. So world war 2. At least we knew what to call it this time. People were probably a bit less fuzzy on the day it officially started, but a lot of that would have to do with what country they lived in. And it still eventually mostly had to be hammered out by historians to really figure out what all should be considered part of it.
So, it’s still a bit schroedinger’s WW3, all these events are in the box waiting to see what they will eventually be called once it’s time to examine the contents of the box.
The US was late to WW1 and WW2. Trump wants to go 3 for 3.
Given Trump’s tendencies, I’m not sure I want us jumping in right away. He’d probably pick the worse side.
He’d probably pick the worse side.
No doubt about it. He obviously love Putin and Kim, and for all of his “Chayna” bullshit, he loves Xi too.
He takes the side of oppressive regimes 10/10 times. Because he loves power and dominating people who are superior to him in every way.
Oh the break up of America is scheduled for any WW3 under Trump. He absolutely could not keep this country together in such extremes.
Martial law is dictatorship anyone who advocates for it under any circumstances is an enemy of freedom
Not really. It’s good for a while when the freedoms of your country are being attacked by another country. It’s a way to get a country to be put on pause while military issues are being handled and everybody is supposed to work together in unison. What it’s not good for is to use it on local opponents or your own people. So just like any other weapon or tool it should be used correctly by people with good intentions. That’s what it’s there for anyways. Almost every country has a form of martial law.
You are talking exactly like a dictator. Freedom is not something you give to people and take away when needed. A switch to take freedom away shouldn’t exist and whoever press it is attacking freedom themself.
Almost every country has a form of martial law.
Almost every country is a police state rooted in murder and violence ruled by corrupted politicians.
So, you can’t accept the idea that in very specific circumstances it can be a good thing for cops to tell you to do something without having to reach for a court order? Like an emergency evacuation order that needs to be secret during that very same hour for whatever good reason or the checkpointing of people in a region where you know that a major prison break just happened?
Not talking about the random pig just thinking “hmm, I’m the boss now” out of nowhere; I’m talking about someone like the head of the police forces giving an order indiscriminately that is limited to a temporal scope.
Even things like “masks are mandatory” can be seen as a “muh freedoms” violation.
If you take things to such extremes, can we have the freedom not to have such freedom? Apparently is what the entire world wants except for a few thousand internet folks
I can’t tell if these kind of comments in support of human rights being curtailed in secret are honest. There are already protocols in place for many jurisdictions that permit declarations of emergency in different contexts - like an environmental disaster. Many of these Emergency protocols are subjected to strict application and review.
Police are expected to train and learn the conditions that should exist when exercising commands to members of the public - such as the differences between reasonable suspicions or exigent circumstances. Or at what point are they simply making inquiries or when they’ve conducted an actual stop of a person. Their conduct is regularly subjected to review when it comes to trial - and some times more immediately if the public is upset by way of civilian committees or other types of review.
Perhaps things get more “murky” when discussing Five Eyes issues and how warrants are issued, but even still there’s a process in place - however flawed or imperfect it may be.
I think the take away from all that is rights are “enshrined” and must demonstrably be treated as a priority even if the actual outcomes are at issue or visibly imperfect.
I just want to add that even elsewhere on this lemmy post, there was mention that the military did deploy. But, soldiers were reportedly not motivated to secure GOV buildings because they’re also aware of their own responsibilities - including the need to follow lawful orders and their Rules of Engagement. If there were no checks in place for these exercises of power, no forums of justice to deal with improper violations of rights, people would just start going full vigilante and what’s the point of hundreds of years of rule of law at that point.
And yes I think the whole thing was an embarrassing stunt on the most highest profile stage South Korea has to offer.
needs to be secret
Nothing that belongs to the public needs to be secret. You are describing kidnapping people.
If you take things to such extremes, can we have the freedom not to have such freedom?
You are the one taking things to extremes trying to compare martial law with wearing masks and making stupid analogies.
I obviously do not support this application of martial law. I pointed at a mask mandate because it fits your dictatorship vision.
I also didn’t say a thing about kidnapping. Telling people to “get off a plane” without a justification is not kidnapping. If you say “get off this plane, we think it has a bomb on it” things wouldn’t fly any better with people freaking over and having panic attacks. You can do the explaining once people are out of the plane.
You should really learn more about what exactly makes a country because unconditional freedom does not exist. You are part of a country that has laws and a bunch of freedoms. Those freedoms exist because other laws protect it.
Almost every country is a police state rooted in murder and violence ruled by corrupted politicians.
I do not deny that a lot of countries are becoming very authoritarian. But martial law is just a tool, which can be used for good but also for bad. In this case it doesn’t seem to be a good reason, but that does not mean it’s a bad thing by itself.
You should really learn more about what exactly makes a country
I encourage you to do the same and learn the history of how your country come to be.
But martial law is just a tool, which can be used for good but also
Name one time it was used for good
Lmao.
Last time was when Nazi Germany invaded my country.
This is what happened last time Nazi Germany invaded mine.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Italian_resistance_movement
“Their ranks were gradually increased by the influx of young men escaping the Italian Social Republic’s draft, as well as from deserters from the RSI armed forces. By August 1944, the number of partisans had grown to 100,000, and it escalated to more than 250,000 with the final insurrection in April”
I didn’t ask.
Disagree.
The whole “any circumstances” is a dangerous stance, man. Any? Like… ANY?
Name any circumstances where slavery is good. Any of them.
Slavery? Don’t bait and switch me. You said Marshall law.
Slavery is part of the human condition. Africans did it too. Google Firestone sometime. We humans seem to constantly make the mistake that we’re too good to enslave eachother, while we go on enslaving eachother, and… pretend no one is, even in a country it doesn’t exist(totally does) in.
This doesn’t get into whether or not you’re in the camp that the entire idea of money is just slavery with a fake sense of autonomy, but I guess that depends on the point you want to make and how you season it.
Actually, if you wanted to make that argument, you could say that all of human society is thanks to some form of slavery.
…when you put it like that, yikes, guys.
Not a good look, and I have a hard time seeing the people of South Korea accept this and just rolling over. Ugh.
But the military seems to be going along with it, blocking out legislators (even from Yoon’s own party).
And, uh, the precedent for that isn’t good, even if a majority dont support it.
I’m sure this will just be a misunderstanding that will be cleared up in no time. Let me know when that happens.
… I’ll be in my bunker.
world users not beating accussations of never reading linked article
Woosh
Should… we be alarmed by this?
Not just yet. It sounds like it’s him against the rest of the government. Hopefully he can be removed swiftly.
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It’s not their first time descending into a dictatorship.
can’t they have a no-confidence vote?
He’s using the military to block legislators from making any vote to end this
It’s honestly insane that these sorts of technicalities are even possible to block the vote. “I called dictatorshipsies and you weren’t in the parliament building when you clearly, overwhelmingly said ‘no’, so I guess no takesies backsies.” There probably ought to be some sort of provision in Korean law going forward that if it isn’t possible to enter the parliament building, they can hold the vote elsewhere.
Worth noting is that the unanimous vote includes members of the president’s party (as far as I can see from skimming headlines. They’re dropping fast…)
Yonhap news agency cited the military as saying activities by parliament and political parties would be banned, and that media and publishers would be under the control of the martial law command.
i see now, article was updated
Yoon cited a motion by the country’s opposition Democratic Party, which has a majority in parliament
hol up, just how this happens
The president and the government seems to have a longer mandate than the individual representatives.
They lost the last election, hard, so this is a lame duck government.
He’s president, not prime minister. Removing him would require an impeachment, which usually has a higher barrier then a no confidence vote, though I’m not familiar with Korean government.
ok but PPP with 108 seats out of 300 somehow forms government, and not DPK with 170
Yup the south is totally a democracy guys. It’s those northern communists that are pillaging out happiness. Pay no mind to the capitalist hellscape it’s actually communisms fault. Oh you don’t agree we’ll time to declare martial law. Democratically
Watch the rest of South Korea’s politicians swiftly depose Yoon for this absolute fuckery (edit: to clarify, even his own party is lambasting this as unconstitutional). I’ve never seen a change in leadership, meanwhile, as North Korea has spent at minimum the last 35 years under a dictator imposing martial law in the form of Songun, spending 25% of their budget on the military while millions of their people have starved to death.
Piss off with this disgusting, tankie bullshit.
Edit: Two hours after the declaration, their parliament has voted 190–0 to end martial law. Totally North Korea, guys.
I didn’t say north Korea was good but ok.
I was making fun of Yoon’s reasoning here where he literally blamed communists for pillaging happiness from the south. I guess that’s not allowed without also condemning north Korea?
So do you condemn North Korea’s use of martial law? It seems oddly coincidental that your comment sounds so much like typical “actually, South Korea are the bad guys; North Korea true, prosperous Korea” fare and that you only protest my comment after this coup attempt was shut down by the National Assembly.
Well if you’re still paying attention it doesn’t seem so over yet what with the attempted arrest of political opposition. We’ll see how it plays out. Hopefully peacefully.
South Korea are the bad guys. Well not THE bad guys. Just some bad guys. Like their government is famously corrupt and rather recently a dictatorship as well. North Korea martial law is also bad but not directly pertinent to this news story. Odd that whenever something bad happen in the south you feel you must jump up and shout that the north is worse.
Not directly pertinent
You literally started this comment chain by drawing a comparison of Yoon’s actions you were condemning to those of North Korea. You made it pertinent. Interesting trying to both-sides North and South Korea, though. Modern ROK and modern DPRK are definitely both very comparably bad. Yep.
I was mocking the words Yoon said himself that blamed the communists for having to do this. So I suppose pertinent if you want to take what he says at face value and believe he did this because of the commies pillaging the happiness of the south. I wouldn’t believe him if I where you but you do what you like.
Since I do not believe him and instead believe that he is lying and wants to maintain power for himself the conditions in North Korea do not actually pertain to whether or not Yoon’s declaration of martial law has merit.
It’s bad to declare martial law. It’s funny to blame your fascistic actions on commies. It’s weird to insist that we have to talk about North Korea before we can say Yoon is being ridiculous.
I agree that the ROK and DPRK are largely incomparable.
Do you agree that Yoon is ridiculous for blaming commies in the north or do you think that actually is relevant to his reasoning?
Yup, Yoon’s stated reasoning was a ridiculous pretext to justify a military coup and evade accountability, and he should be ousted immediately and thrown in jail.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_presidents_of_South_Korea
You’ve never seen a change in leadership? They’ve changed presidents and parties fairly regularly…
My comment is referring to North Korea’s leadership. Technically I’ve seen Kim Il Sung –> Kim Jong Il –> Kim Jong Un, but I don’t consider that “new leadership”, because it isn’t; it’s the same line of a hereditary dictatorship.
Oh, I see. Yeah, that’s accurate.
Edit: Two hours after the declaration, their parliament has voted 190–0 to end martial law. Totally North Korea, guys.
https://www.bbc.com/news/live/cn38321180et?post=asset%3Acb5be5ba-c24f-462c-be58-5fa0b8de3dcc#post
Military says martial law will be maintained until lifted by presidentpublished at 12:23 12:23
The South Korean military says it will maintain martial law until it is lifted by President Yoon Suk Yeol, despite the nation’s parliament voting to block its enforcement, according to the country’s national broadcaster.
Totally normal democracy stuff here guys. Yoon’s also in lame duck period too.
Let’s see how enforceable that declaration actually is with the law itself, the National Assembly, the cabinet whose backs Yoon went behind to pull this stunt, and at least 2/3 of the population who already disapproved of him before this opposing it.
I’d be willing to bet their president does not have direct control over payroll for their military. That tends to put a stop to things pretty damn quick.
I hope this can make realize South Koreans how much stupid mandatory draft is
On the other hand, that may be why the Army let staff members with fire extinguishers keep them out of Parliament. It’s a lot harder to get consent for a coup from the military if the rank and file closely resemble the people instead of a separate class.
The whole point of the draft is to turn people into soldier and a separate class.
Not necessarily. By making the Army everyone, you also make the Army no one. As in, there is no separate class. Contrast this with the US where soldiers are held in high regard, and most volunteers come from military families and rural destitute people. Both of which are disconnected from normal society for their own reasons. Then they live in an insular community for at least 4 years, longer if they stay in. And they’re welcome to stay for at least a decade without becoming an NCO.
A 2 year conscription by comparison means you have a constantly rotating force that reflects society. It’s harder to send to war because it could be anyone’s kids, and it’s harder to use against the people because that requires them to fight against their friends. And if the rotating force idea is kept, then it also requires tacit knowledge that what you do today sets the standard for what’s done against you tomorrow.
Different topic a little, but I think a compulsory year or two of service is good for a society.
That said, nations that do it tend to always make it military, when at minimum, there should be a societal service/peace core option, and preferably that should be the common option taken. (help build homeless housing, soup kitchens, etc)
Here in the US, we aren’t a society. We have a sociopathic culture we try to reframe as being “ruggedly individual” aka free to die in the gutter alone. Empathy is a bad word here and our elite’s children go to different schools than our people. National compulsory service might buy some social buy in.
But we’d rather work against one another in a race to the bottom than lift each other up as a people.
Different topic a little, but I think a compulsory year or two of service is good for a society.
