Politics and Government

Subterms

    More stories

    • 138 Shares169 Views

      in Elections

      South Korea President Yoon Defends Martial Law Decree in Defiant Speech

      by

      President Yoon Suk Yeol vowed to “fight to the end,” despite the opposition’s push to impeach him and his own party’s demand that he resign.President Yoon Suk Yeol on Thursday defended his botched attempt to put South Korea under martial law last week, vowing to “fight to the end” despite the opposition-dominated legislature’s push to impeach him and his own party’s demand that he resign from office.In a televised speech, Mr. Yoon said he had never intended to disrupt the “constitutional order” when he declared martial law on Dec. 3 and sent hundreds of troops into the National Assembly. He said he had done so to “save the country” from what he called the “anti-state” opposition parties. Mr. Yoon said the opposition parties had used their majority in the Assembly to “paralyze” the country.Mr. Yoon said his action was part of his constitutional powers as president and did not amount to “insurrection,” as the opposition has charged.“I will fight to the end,” he said.Mr. Yoon’s People Power Party, which blocked opposition lawmakers’ attempt to impeach him on Saturday, has recommended that he instead resign in February or March. That would mean a new presidential election in April or May, which the party argues is the swiftest way to end the political turmoil triggered by the short-lived martial law decree.But Mr. Yoon indicated in his speech that he intends to remain in office while the opposition tries again to impeach him and, if impeached, will fight his removal at the Constitutional Court.If a president is impeached by the National Assembly, he is suspended from office while the Constitutional Court decides whether to reinstate or formally remove him, a process that can take up to six months.This is a developing story. More

    • 125 Shares139 Views

      in Elections

      Scholz Calls for Confidence Vote, in Step Toward German Elections

      by

      Chancellor Olaf Scholz, who had few alternatives after his three-party coalition broke up, is widely expected to lose when Parliament takes up the measure on Monday.Chancellor Olaf Scholz of Germany called for a confidence vote in Parliament on Wednesday, taking the first formal step toward disbanding the German government and leading to snap elections likely to oust him from office.The move, culminating in a parliamentary vote on Monday, became all but necessary in November, when the chancellor fired his finance minister, precipitating the breakup of his fragile three-party coalition.“In a democracy, it is the voters who determine the course of future politics. When they go to the polls, they decide how we will answer the big questions that lie ahead of us,” Mr. Scholz said from the chancellery in Berlin on Wednesday.Mr. Scholz expects to lose the vote. The collapse of the government along with the early election on Feb. 23 amount to an extraordinary political moment in a country long known for stable governments.The political turbulence in Germany and the fall last week of the government in France have left the European Union with a vacuum of leadership at critical moment: It is facing challenges from Russia’s war in Ukraine and the imminent return to the presidency of Donald J. Trump in the United States.Mr. Trump has threatened a trade war with Europe and has consistently expressed skepticism about America’s commitment to the NATO alliance that has been the guarantor of security on the continent for 75 years.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    • 125 Shares189 Views

      in Elections

      North Korea Breaks Silence on South Korea’s Martial Law Declaration

      by

      In its first statement about the turmoil over President Yoon Suk Yeol’s martial law decree, the North said nothing about how inter-Korean relations might be affected.North Korea made its first public statement on Wednesday about the short-lived declaration of martial law in South Korea last week, with its state media saying that President Yoon Suk Yeol had plunged his country into “pandemonium.”The article gave no indication of how the turmoil in the South might affect relations between the Koreas. Since Mr. Yoon, who has a confrontational policy toward North Korea, took office in 2022, the relationship has reached its lowest point in years.The North’s main government newspaper, the Rodong Sinmun, gave the article relatively little prominence, running it on the sixth page of its Wednesday edition. It summarized Mr. Yoon’s failed attempt to seize control of the National Assembly on Dec. 3 by sending in troops, the spread of protests across South Korea and the political uncertainty that has prevailed since then.“The puppet Yoon Suk Yeol’s shocking decision to level his fascist guns and bayonets at his own people has turned the puppet South into pandemonium,” the article said.It also said that the failure of opposition lawmakers’ attempt to impeach Mr. Yoon in the National Assembly on Saturday, after Mr. Yoon’s People Power Party boycotted the vote, had turned all of South Korea into a “protest scene.”The political vacuum in the South has raised concerns that its government and military could be ill-prepared for any escalation in tensions with Kim Jong-un’s regime in the North.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    • 150 Shares99 Views

      in Elections

      Syrians, in Shock and With Some Unease, Celebrate the Fall of al-Assad

      by

      A day after the regime of President Bashar al-Assad fell, civilians poured into the streets of Damascus, weeping in disbelief. Many sought word of relatives held in a notorious prison on the outskirts of the city.Syrian security checkpoints sat empty on Monday across Damascus. Abandoned tanks were scattered across the roads, along with stray pieces of military uniforms stripped off by soldiers when opposition forces stormed into the city a day earlier.Rebels with rifles slung over their shoulders drove around, many seemingly shocked at just how quickly they had ousted Syria’s long-entrenched president, Bashar al-Assad. Damascus residents, too, were walking around the city’s streets in a state of disbelief.Some rushed to a notorious prison on the outskirts of Damascus, the capital, desperate to find loved ones who had disappeared under Mr. al-Assad’s brutal reign. Others clambered on top of cars and screamed curses at the Assad family, words that days ago could have meant a death sentence.By day’s end, with Mr. al-Assad and his family having fled on a plane to his ally Russia, thousands of Syrians had converged at Umayyad Square in the city center to revel in the fall of the regime and their newfound, if uncertain, sense of freedom.“We’re shocked; all of us are just shocked,” one woman, Shahnaz Sezad, 50, said. “It’s as if we’re all coming back to life after a nightmare.”She watched, tears welling up, as a scene unimaginable just days ago played out in front of her. One rebel shouted into a microphone: “The Syrian people want to execute Bashar! The Syrian people want to execute Bashar!” A deafening “paw-paw-paw” of gunfire sounded as others shot into the air.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    • 63 Shares189 Views

      in Elections

      A Test for the System

      by

      Donald Trump will take office with weakened checks on his power.When the makers of “Schoolhouse Rock” set out in the 1970s to explain how the federal government works, they likened it to a three-ring circus. It was more than just a comment on the chaos of Washington — it was a metaphor for the three coequal branches of government that make our democracy what it is.“Each controls the other, you see,” the song went, “and that’s what we call checks and balances.”I’m an investigative reporter for The New York Times, and I’ve been thinking a lot about how those three branches — the basic building blocks of government — will fare with President-elect Donald Trump returning to power. He has promised to upend the system and use its power to prosecute his political enemies, and Democrats and anti-Trump Republicans warn that means he will use his second presidency to rule like an autocrat, putting extraordinary pressure on the nation’s democratic experiment.Some people I have spoken to about this, including top officials from Trump’s first administration, have faith in the three branches of government, a system built to keep presidents’ power in check.But the country’s three branches of government are in a weaker position to hold a president accountable than they were when Trump first took office in 2017, in part because of the stranglehold he has over his own party. And some of the change he has promised to bring to Washington would only further erode checks and balances.“He’s enjoying unified government but, just as importantly, the party itself has been remade in his image,” said William Howell, the dean of the new Johns Hopkins School of Government and Policy in Washington.A matter of civicsThe founders wrote the Constitution purposely to prevent any single person from amassing too much power. To do this, they set up three branches of government intended not just to check each other, but to be rivals for power.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    • 125 Shares99 Views

      in Elections

      John Dramani Mahama Is Set to Return as Ghana’s President

      by

      John Dramani Mahama, who served as president from 2012 to 2017, is set to return to office after his main opponent, Mahamudu Bawumia, conceded defeat.John Dramani Mahama, a former president of Ghana who was voted out of office eight years ago, staged a dramatic political comeback on Sunday after his main opponent conceded defeat in the West African country’s presidential election.While official results from the vote that took place on Saturday have yet to be released, the candidate of the governing party, Vice President Mahamudu Bawumia, said he had called Mr. Mahama to congratulate him on his victory.Mr. Bawumia said in a statement that data collected by his team showed that Mr. Mahama had “won the presidential election decisively.”Ghana, the largest gold producer in Africa and a key U.S. security ally in a region beset by coups and jihadist insurgencies, has been struggling with one of its worst economic crises in decades.After the government defaulted in 2022 to its international lenders, last year it contracted a $3 billion loan from the International Monetary Fund.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    • 100 Shares159 Views

      in Elections

      South Korea Unsure Who Is Running the Government

      by

      President Yoon Suk Yeol’s ill-fated bid to impose martial law has created a power vacuum in his governing camp, pushing the country deeper into what analysts call a constitutional crisis.South Korea’s government was paralyzed Sunday, mired in a new constitutional crisis after President Yoon Suk Yeol of South Korea clung to his office, but his own party’s leader suggested that he had already been ousted from power.Mr. Yoon has barely been seen in public since his ill-fated decision last week to declare martial law. Meanwhile, Han Dong-hoon, the chairman of Mr. Yoon’s People Power Party, or P.P.P., has presented himself as the government’s decision maker and said the president is no longer running the country.The trouble is that South Korea’s Constitution doesn’t allow for anyone to replace the president unless he resigns or is impeached.Mr. Yoon’s office did not comment on Mr. Han’s statement. But Mr. Yoon “has not and by law, cannot, cede power to anyone” except through resignation, impeachment or election, said a senior government source familiar with the discussions inside Mr. Yoon’s office. Mr. Yoon exercised his role as president on Sunday by accepting the resignation of his home minister, Lee Sang-min.Opposition groups immediately complained that Mr. Han was overreaching: trying to use the power vacuum created by Mr. Yoon’s ill-fated imposition of martial law and the ensuing turmoil to establish himself as the top leader in the governing camp.“We have a situation where the president cannot make decisions, he cannot give guidelines, he cannot give orders,” said Kang Won-taek, a professor of political science at Seoul National University. “Although we have a president, we are in a state of anarchy.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    • 125 Shares189 Views

      in Elections

      South Korea’s Ex-Defense Chief Is Detained Over Martial Law Episode

      by

      Prosecutors are investigating whether President Yoon Suk Yeol and his followers committed insurrection when they briefly put South Korea under martial law.Kim Yong-hyun, the former defense minister of South Korea, was taken into custody early Sunday as prosecutors investigated his role in President Yoon Suk Yeol’s short-lived effort last week to impose martial law. That episode set off political upheaval in South Korea, including an opposition-led attempt to impeach the president and huge protests.Mr. Kim is the first person to be detained as prosecutors begin their investigation into allegations made by President Yoon’s political opponents​. The opposition asserts that Mr. Yoon and his followers in the ​government and military​ committed insurrection and other crimes when they sent soldiers and police officers into the National Assembly to seize the legislature shortly after the president declared martial law on Tuesday night.Mr. Kim, who surrendered himself to investigators early Sunday, was arrested with​out a court warrant. The police and prosecutors ​can use such an “emergency​ arrest” when they have grounds to suspect a person committed a serious crime and there is risk of them fleeing or destroying evidence. ​They must apply for a court warrant​ within two days to formally arrest the suspect.Mr. Kim, a key supporter of Mr. Yoon’s martial law plan, resigned after the extraordinary move fell through. The military rule lasted only six hours, after the National Assembly voted against it early Wednesday and forced Mr. Yoon to back down.It was unclear whether Mr. Kim had a legal representative. Before his arrest, in an interview with the daily Dong-A Ilbo, he said he had been involved in Mr. Yoon’s declaration of martial law, but that it was imposed according to legal procedures.​For most of the two and a half years he has been in office, Mr. Yoon has endured low approval ratings and been in a near-constant political standoff with the opposition. They have tussled especially over his refusal to accept their demands that a special prosecutor be appointed to investigate allegations of corruption involving his wife.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More