Police vow stern response to illegal rallies on Aug. 15

Police warned Monday of strong action against illegal protests, after several civic groups said they planned to gather in downtown Seoul to hold rallies around the Aug. 15 Liberation Day holiday.

The ban on rallies by the Seoul city government is over concerns that such mass gatherings at a time when COVID-19 cases are surging nationwide could exacerbate the spread of the coronavirus, Choi Kwan-ho, chief of the Seoul Metropolitan Police Agency, said in a news briefing.

“I implore the groups to refrain from staging rallies,” he said, “and to help the country return to normal as soon as possible.”

Despite the government’s repeated pleas not to gather en masse to stem the spread of the coronavirus, unions and other civic groups have staged rallies and said they would march again for various causes.

As recently as Friday, the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions (KCTU) forged ahead with a planned rally in Wonju, central South Korea. Around 100 KCTU members and others demanded that the National Health Insurance Service (NHIS) hire its call center workers directly rather than through a third party.

Earlier last month, the militant union marched through downtown Seoul in a packed rally where participants wore masks.

Choi said 15 members of the group’s leadership have been grilled over the illegal assembly and Yang Kyung-soo, head of the KCTU, will be questioned Wednesday.

He said police have also been investigating core figures involved in two massive rallies in June — one by delivery workers and the other by small business owners.