Clashes erupt at antigovernment protests in Seoul

Demonstrators, many of whom wore masks and carried banners, took over a major street and marched between tight perimeters outlined by police buses.

Trade unions, farmers’ associations and other groups had rallied 70,000 people to demand Ms Park’s resignation and an end to redundancies.

A rally organizer representative revealed at a briefing outside Seoul National University Hospital that Baek had undergone an operation for a brain hemorrhage.

The police arrested 51 people and are questioning them on various charges including illegal protest, assaulting police officers and destroying public equipment.

The spokesperson accused police of shooting their cannons “indiscriminately”.

But footage from the protests shows an unarmed farmer being bowled over by a powerful blast from a police hose. Some of the protesters attached ropes to the police buses to pull them away, rocked the buses back and forth, and broke windows, and a few of the buses were dragged into the middle of the road. “According to reports I have received, the use of water cannons was in line with the regulations”, said Gu Eun-su, commissioner of the Seoul Metropolitan Police Agency, on November 15. New weapons for the police: soybean oil, silicone and saws on long poles In addition to the water cannons, the police also deployed several new kinds of anti-riot weapons, as if they were competing with the protesters.

Demonstrators have criticized police for excessive response to anti-government gathering During massive demonstrations on November 14, to prevent demonstrators from reaching Gwanghwamun Plaza, the police fired multiple water cannons from all directions.

The police say that this might be the largest street protest in Seoul in the last seven years.

Seoul authorities had issued an arrest warrant for Han after he failed to appear in court in connection with his role in organizing a May protest that turned violent.

Kim further chastised labor groups for hindering authorities from arresting Han Sang-kyun, chairman of the KCTU, saying it was “intolerable” for them to interfere with the police.

Labor groups have been denouncing government attempts to change labor laws to allow larger freedom for companies in laying off workers, which policymakers say would be critical in improving a bleak job market for young people.

Demonstrators also opposed the imposition of as yet unpublished history textbooks on secondary schools from 2017, fearing that they will whitewash South Korea’s decades of military dictatorship.

The rule of Park Chung-hee, who is Park Guen-hye’s father, ended after he was assassinated by the head of his own central intelligence agency after vowing to crush protests against his government “even if to cost 30,000 lives”.