In Seoul, Blinken affirms alliance amid challenges facing democracies

Both Secretary of State Antony Blinken and South Korean Foreign Minister Cho Tae-yul acknowledged the challenges facing democracy in their countries on Monday, while emphasizing that the alliance between the two countries remains strong despite this. Ongoing political unrest.

“Our relationship is bigger than any one leader, any one government, or any one party,” Blinken said at a news conference with Zhou, referring to the change in leadership in both countries. As for the incident that occurred in South Korea – in which the president was removed after declaring martial law – it surprised the world and is still continuing.

“I think what we’ve seen in our country, as well as in other democracies that have faced challenges, has been a response that has been openly transparent, and doesn’t pretend that we don’t have problems or challenges,” Mr. Blinken added. “It confronts them, and this confronts them directly.”

Blinken said Russia intends to help North Korea by sharing space and satellite technology with Pyongyang — and perhaps accepting a nuclear weapons program, which would be a reversal of decades of policy. Mr. Blinken spoke publicly for the first time last year about the possibility of Moscow sharing the technology.

The deepening political crisis in South Korea, sparked last month by Yoon Suk-yeol, a conservative politician elected president in 2022, has put Mr. Blinken and President Biden in a difficult position in the final days before President-elect Donald J. Trump. He takes office for a second term. Mr. Yoon, who was impeached by the Legislative Council on December 14 after a surprise but short-lived attack Declaration of martial lawHoled up in a hillside compound with presidential guards, he resists the police who try to issue an arrest warrant for him.

Mr. Blinken said the United States had “serious concerns” about Mr. Yoon’s actions last month and had communicated this to the South Korean government.

Mr. Zhou said that his country’s democratic guardrails are resilient, and that “the international community is focused on resilience, and this is the right way to evaluate our society.”

Mr. Blinken noted that he was making his fourth visit to South Korea as Secretary of State and his 21st visit to the Indo-Pacific region, and that this latest diplomatic mission in his current position brought him full circle. He and Lloyd J. went. Austin III, US Secretary of Defense, to South Korea and Japan for joint meetings in 2021 in their first foreign trips as secretaries of government.

Mr. Blinken is on a marathon trip around the world: He plans to hold meetings in Japan on Tuesday, in France on Wednesday, and in Italy on Thursday, before crossing paths with Mr. Biden in Rome to visit Pope Francis at the Vatican on Saturday. Mr. Blinken met with the Pope in November.

Mr. Biden, his senior aides and U.S. intelligence agencies were caught by surprise by the anti-democratic Mr. Yoon’s seizure of power. It was an embarrassment for Mr. Biden — the US president had hailed Mr. Yoon as a champion of democracy and chose South Korea to host one of his pet projects, the Democracy Summit, an initiative aimed at strengthening global democratic power. In March, Mr. Yoon chaired the third session in Seoul.

Mr. Biden celebrated Mr. Yoon at a state dinner in April 2023 in Washington, where he wore formal evening wear. Mr. Yoon sang “American Pie” For the loving audience. South Korea, along with Japan, has been a decades-long US ally in East Asia, and strengthening those military alliances has been a crucial part of Biden’s strategy to constrain China. In August 2023, Mr. Biden hosted Mr. Yoon and then-Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida at Camp David announces A new tripartite security arrangement between the three countries.

The US-South Korea alliance is also intended to deter North Korea, and Biden has relied on South Korea for help. Supply of artillery shells of the Ukrainian army in its defense against the large-scale Russian invasion. The missiles go to Ukraine through the US Army.

When Mr. Yoon declared martial law on December 3, so did the Biden administration She expressed concern but refrained from condemning Mr. YoonAlthough his move reflects Mr. Trump’s efforts to cling to power after Mr. Biden’s 2020 election victory.

Indeed, Mr. Yoon’s supporters, who gather in the streets daily near his complex, draw directly from Mr. Trump’s playbook — they carry signs reading “Stop the steal” In English, a clarion call to Mr. Trump for help, chanting the slogan at rallies. On Sunday, as Mr. Blinken was traveling to Seoul, pro-democracy demonstrators seeking to remove Mr. Yoon from office gathered in fresh snow near the complex while Mr. Yoon’s supporters staged counter-protests. Hundreds of police officers in neon yellow vests watched warily.

On Monday morning, Mr. Blinken left his hotel, a few blocks from the protests, and went to the presidential offices to meet with the acting president, Choe Sang-mok, who also serves as deputy prime minister and finance minister. Then he had lunch with Mr. Zhou, Minister of Foreign Affairs. Both Korean officials are career bureaucrats appointed to their positions by Mr. Yoon.

After the news conference with Mr. Chu, Mr. Blinken heard from the other side of the political divide. He went to the National Assembly building, where he met Woo Won-shik, the assembly speaker and a member of the opposition party. Mr. Wu was on a list of political enemies whom Mr. Yoon wanted soldiers to arrest after martial law was imposed, according to prosecutors.

Mr. Yoon’s suspension left South Korea without an elected leader for its government, adding uncertainty to its diplomacy at a time when it faces much external uncertainty, including Mr. Trump’s skepticism of American alliances and growing nuclear hostility from North Korea.

Both the interim president and the progressive opposition have committed to an alliance with Washington as internal political turmoil continues. But Mr. Blinken had to tread carefully on both sides of the political conflict here.

Mr. Yoon has been more enthusiastic about the American alliance than any other South Korean leader in recent decades. That pleased the right-wing support base of both Mr. Biden and Mr. Yoon.

But he has long suffered from poor approval ratings. His efforts to improve relations with Japan, which Washington praised as a bold initiative that made the trilateral partnership possible, were not well received by most South Koreans.

His government sent police and prosecutors to the homes and offices of unfriendly journalists whom he accused of spreading “fake news.” He used his presidential power to veto a series of bills introduced by the opposition to investigate allegations of corruption and abuse of power involving himself, his office, and his wife. Meanwhile, the opposition has used its majority power in the National Assembly to block his budget plans and fire officials and prosecutors seen as allies of Mr. Yoon.

If the Constitutional Court upholds Mr. Yoon’s impeachment in the coming months, he will be formally removed from office. He also faces separate criminal investigations. Prosecutors say he committed rebellion when he sent troops into the assembly to try to prevent it from voting to reject martial law and arrest his political opponents.

Around the presidential residence, Mr. Yoon’s bodyguards built barricades with buses and coils of razor wire over the weekend to deter criminal investigators and police officers from entering the complex to enforce a court order to detain him for questioning. Investigators failed in their first attempt on Friday, and were not to try again while Mr. Blinken was in Seoul. The foreign minister left the country early Monday evening, and Seoul residents braced for another possible police raid.