South Korea has closed 2024 with one of its most turbulent months. This last Sunday of the year the country has experienced which is already the worst area tragedy in its history after a plane carrying 181 people crashed while trying to make an emergency landing at Muan airport, in the south of the country. Almost all of them, with the sole exception of two sole survivors, have ended up losing their lives. And this incident, in addition to having produced a great commotion throughout the country, It occurs in the midst of great political instabilitywith the removal of two presidents in less than 15 days and with a rivalry with its neighbor North Korea that has not stopped growing.
It was at the beginning of December when everything seemed to blow up. On December 3, the country’s leader, President Yoon Suk Yeol, decided to declare martial law after accusing the opposition to sympathize with North Korea and paralyze the Government with anti-state activities. After several chaotic hours in the capital, and with thousands of people taking to the streets in protest, the president ended up revoking the rule after This is what the majority of South Korean parliamentarians decidedwho were gathered until the early hours of the morning.
Despite this, his decision shook the entire politics of the country and has increased a path full of stones. As street protests continued, the leader lost the confidence of his own party and the six opposition parties, led by the Democratic Party (PD), They presented a motion to remove him and impeach him. In addition, the Police opened an investigation against him for allegedly having committed a crime of treason after the declaration of the norm.
Days after all this, Yoon Suk Yeol himself apologized for what happened in a press conference, claiming that his decision was the result of “anxiety” and “despair.” “I leave it in the hands of the party to discover how to stabilize the political situation, even during my mandate,” he stated in that appearance. Their own formation, in fact, finally came to block the impeachment that the opposition had presented by absenting themselves from the vote on December 7, so the motion of censure failed at first.
We had to wait another seven days, until December 14, for the South Korean Parliament to end up dismissing the president with a new motion in which 200 parliamentarians – out of a total of 300 – ended up voting in favor of its success. With a secret vote, Yoon was immediately disabled with the support, in addition, of 12 parliamentarians from his own party for this decision.
In the lead up to this moment, which produced a great celebration in the streets, the authorities They also decided to arrest the former South Korean Defense MinisterKim Yong Hyun, for his alleged involvement in the declaration of martial law. Likewise, Parliament approved disqualifying the minister of justice and the national police chief.
Another president dismissed
Yoon’s departure brought with it the decision that Prime Minister Han Duck-soo would also take over. on an interim basis the head of State and Government. All this while waiting for the country’s Constitutional Court to determine within a maximum period of 180 days whether or not the president violated the Magna Carta by declaring martial law. However, Han’s statements in which he stated that he would not appoint any judge of the Constitutional Court to fill the three vacant positions in the body until the political parties reached a new political consensus, also ended up unleashing criticism from the opposition.
Given this scenario, last Thursday a new motion of censure was presented, this time against Han, who It ended up being approved on Friday with 192 votes in favor and none against after the president of the National Assembly decided that the motion could be approved with a simple majority and not a two-thirds majority, a decision that once again generated protests among a large number of parliamentarians present in the chamber. With this decision, the position has now fallen to Choi Sang-mokwho until now was vice president of the country, and who has finally been declared interim president and prime minister of the Republic of Korea.
The worst plane crash in the country
In the midst of all this climax of instability, Choi, with only two days in office, has had to live through what has become the worst air tragedy in the country and one of the largest in all of Asia. 179 dead and only two survivors is the final balance of the 181 people who were on board Jeju Air flight 7C2216, which ended up exploding after hitting a wall during an emergency landing.
The facts, which are still being investigated, point to a collision with a flock of birds. This, apparently, would have caused a failure in the landing gear, so the plane’s wheels would not have been able to deploy, nor would the brakes. After skidding for 10 seconds on the landing strip, The aircraft ended up hitting a wall and explodingso the flames ended up destroying almost all of the infrastructure, except for the tail of the plane.
The incident has caused a great wave of shock in the country and Choi has declared seven days of national mourning that started this Monday. In addition, the president has declared Muan, the place where the incident occurred, 288 kilometers from Seoul, as a special area affected by a disaster.
The South Korean Army warns about North Korea
Added to all this is growing tension with North Korea after this country decided to send troops to Ukraine to fight alongside Russian forces. Without official confirmation yet from Moscow or Pyongyang, South Korean intelligence, along with American intelligence, has been one of those that has confirmed these facts, warning that Thousands of North Korean soldiers would have arrived in Ukraineof which around 1,000 have already been killed or injured in the Ukrainian region of Kursk.
This same Sunday, in addition, the General Staff of the South Korean Army has warned that its northern rival a new military deployment is already being finalized of support for Vladimir Putin, which could be additional support or a rotation for those already in European territory.
“A comprehensive intelligence assessment shows that North Korea is preparing to rotate or increase troop deployments to Russia, while currently supplies 240-millimeter rocket launchers and 170-mm self-propelled artillery,” describes the South Korean Army in a statement. “There are also some indications that the North is increasingly geared toward manufacturing and supplying explosive drones, revealed for the first time during the inspection on site carried out by Kim Jong Un in November”, they also warn from Seoul.
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