EGN NEWS DESK
The South Korean marines have been despatched in after monsoon rains flooded a rural part of the nation’s heartland final July. They have been on the lookout for lacking residents in waist-high floodwaters, however they weren’t carrying life jackets. Nor did they’ve buoys or security tubes.
When the bottom gave approach, 5 of them have been swept away within the churning brown water and one, Lance Cpl. Chae Su-geun, disappeared downstream, yelling for assist, and was later discovered dead.
Nearly a yr later, the dying of the 20-year-old marine has turn into an impeachment risk for South Korea’s chief, President Yoon Suk Yeol. And it has raised the prospect of political instability within the nation, a key United States ally in making a bulwark in opposition to North Korea and China.
The South Korean navy is not any stranger to tragic accidents, however this newest episode has developed into the primary main political disaster for Mr. Yoon since his party’s crushing defeat in parliamentary elections final month. The profession navy officer who investigated Lance Corporal Chae’s dying has accused the Defense Ministry of whitewashing the probe and absolving prime navy brass of accountability — all below strain from Mr. Yoon.
Mr. Yoon has indirectly addressed the allegation, and final week the president vetoed a invoice pushed by means of Parliament by the opposition calling for a particular prosecutor to analyze the declare. The president needs authorities businesses just like the police and prosecutors to complete investigating the assorted allegations earlier than discussing different steps.
But there may be huge public assist for appointing a particular prosecutor, surveys present, as many South Koreans have grown distrustful of Mr. Yoon and authorities prosecutors. Mr. Yoon’s opponents say that whereas prosecutors have launched legal investigations into his critics and journalists accused of spreading “faux information,” they haven’t investigated allegations of corruption in opposition to his spouse, Kim Keon Hee, with the identical eagerness. (This and a string of different scandals contributed to Mr. Yoon’s poor exhibiting in final month’s election.)
The opposition has threatened to start impeachment proceedings in opposition to Mr. Yoon if he retains resisting its demand.
“The Yoon regime mustn’t overlook classes of historical past,” mentioned Lee Jae-myung, the chief of the liberal opposition, referring to former presidents who’ve been imprisoned or impeached for corruption and abuse of energy.
The opposition has an even bigger majority in a newly elected Parliament that was inaugurated Thursday. It plans to cross one other special-prosecutor invoice however it stays to be seen whether or not it has the votes to override a presidential veto or sufficient public assist and incriminating proof in opposition to Mr. Yoon to start impeachment proceedings in opposition to him.
Days after the dying of Lance Corporal Chae, a probe launched by the South Korean Marine Corps concluded that he and his fellow marines had not been given life jackets or security tubes. The knee-high rubber boots they have been issued impeded their motion within the water. The navy has admitted to the protection lapses.
The inquiry additionally concluded that eight supervisors, together with Maj. Gen. Im Seong-geun, commander of the first Marine Division, have been liable for Lance Corporal Chae’s dying by means of negligence. The then-defense minister, Lee Jong-sup, signed off on the findings to be forwarded, as required by legislation, to the nationwide police for additional investigation. He greenlighted the investigators’ plan to temporary the information media.
“But in lower than 24 hours, all the choices have been reversed, and all the things become a multitude,” mentioned Col. Park Jung-hun, the highest investigator.
Mr. Lee ordered Colonel Park to cancel the media briefing that had been deliberate for the following day. The Defense Ministry retracted the recordsdata Colonel Park had despatched to the police. It later despatched the police a revised model that named solely two of the unique eight, each lieutenant colonels, in reference to Lance Corporal Chae’s dying.
Colonel Park has mentioned that the highest Marine commander instructed him that when Mr. Yoon realized of the colonel’s findings, he “flew right into a rage” and referred to as Mr. Lee to precise his anger. (The commander denied making such a press release.) Colonel Park mentioned the president’s response was adopted by strain from the Defense Ministry to expunge the names of prime officers like Major General Im as legal suspects from his report.
Mr. Yoon has indirectly addressed the allegation, and his workplace has declined to remark, pending investigations by the police and the Corruption Investigation Office For High-Ranking Officials, a authorities company. Mr. Lee has denied being pressured by Mr. Yoon’s workplace. And analysts have struggled to elucidate why Mr. Yoon could have taken such an motion.
But Colonel Park has stood by his allegation. The Defense Ministry has moved to court-martial him on fees of insubordination. Officials say that he ignored an order to delay handing over the investigation recordsdata to the police. The colonel says that the recordsdata have been already en path to the police when he acquired the order. He has mentioned he’s being persecuted for resisting strain to take away the names of senior officers from his report.
During Colonel Park’s court-martial trial this month, Yoo Jae-eun, an aide to the protection minister, was referred to as to testify. She mentioned that when she referred to as the colonel below Mr. Lee’s instruction, she prompt that he not identify any legal suspects or cite any suspected crime in his report. She insisted that the suggestion was meant not as undue strain however as “one of many choices” for the colonel to think about.
Another marine who was swept into floodwaters and has since been discharged has sued Major General Im for skilled negligence. He claims that his unit was ordered into the harmful waters to please the final, whose obsession with publicity he mentioned guided his models’ disaster-relief actions. Major General Im has referred to as the lawsuit “libelous.”
Mr. Yoon has expressed condolences over Lance Corporal Chae’s dying and criticized the marines’ operation within the floodwaters, however he has been silent on the allegation of unlawful strain. But South Koreans have usually discovered selections by Mr. Yoon “mysterious,” Lee Jin-young, an editorial author on the conservative every day Dong-A Ilbo, mentioned in her column. When Mr. Yoon made “impulsive” selections, his employees lacked the braveness to resist his “rage” and communicate up, she mentioned.
“Instead, when the president hits the fallacious goal, they draw a bull’s-eye round it,” Ms. Lee wrote. “As this repeats, scandals erupt and his approval rankings fall.”
