SEOUL: South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol said on Tuesday he has upgraded the country’s alliance with the United States to one that is “nuclear-based” in the face of North Korea’s growing military threat.
Yoon was referring to his talks with US President Joe Biden in April on Washington’s willingness to give Seoul more insight into its nuclear planning in the event of potential conflict with nuclear-armed North Korea.
“North Korea is enhancing its nuclear and missile capabilities, and has legislated the use of nuclear weapons,” Yoon said in a speech marking South Korea’s Memorial Day.
At their summit in Washington, the two leaders agreed to strengthen the so-called US extended deterrence, which envisions the use of US nuclear weapons to defend the South.
“The South Korea-US alliance has now been elevated to ‘nuclear-based’ alliance,” Yoon said.
North Korea this year test-fired its biggest intercontinental ballistic missile and last week attempted to launch its first spy satellite, although the rocket and the payload plunged into the sea.
North Korea made a rare and swift admission of the launch’s failure but vowed to try again and put a satellite in orbit to increase its military surveillance capabilities.
The launch was widely condemned as violating UN Security Council resolutions that ban the use of ballistic missile technology by the North.
Pyongyang has rejected the ban as an infringement of its sovereign right to self-defense and space development.
While Yoon characterized his talks with Biden as an agreement to use US nuclear weapons in the event of a North Korean nuclear attack, Biden reiterated a pledge “to make every effort to consult” with allies on the use of a nuclear weapon.
Yoon did not elaborate further on the subject and devoted most of his Memorial Day speech to honoring those who had made sacrifices in defense of the country.
South Korea’s military has been undertaking a salvage operation at sea off the west coast to recover a substantial segment of the rocket launched by the North on May 31.
South Korea’s Yoon says alliance with US ‘nuclear-based’
https://arab.news/byrcm
South Korea’s Yoon says alliance with US ‘nuclear-based’
- Upgrade in alliance in the face of North Korea’s growing military threat
- North Korea this year test-fired its biggest intercontinental ballistic missile
Ugandan opposition denounces ‘military state’ ahead of election
KAMPALA: As dark clouds gathered overhead, young and old members of Uganda’s long-embattled opposition gathered for prayers at the home of an imprisoned politician — the mood both defiant and bleak.
The mayor of Kampala, Erias Lukwago, told the gathering on Sunday that this week’s election was a “face off” between ordinary Ugandans and President Yoweri Museveni.
“All of you are in two categories: political prisoners and potential political prisoners,” he said.
Museveni is widely expected to extend his 40-year rule of the east African country in Thursday’s election, thanks to his near-total control of the state and security apparatus.
The 81-year-old came to power as a bush fighter in the 1980s and has maintained a militarised control over the country, brutally cracking down on challengers.
The latest campaign has seen hundreds of opposition supporters arrested and at least one killed, with the police claiming they are confronting “hooligans.”
The main opposition candidate Bobi Wine, real name Robert Kyagulanyi, is rarely seen in public without his flak jacket and has described the campaign as a “war.”
He has been arrested multiple times in the past and tortured in military custody.
The only other significant opposition leader, Kizza Besigye, was kidnapped in Kenya in 2024 and secretly smuggled to a Ugandan military prison to face treason charges in a case that has dragged on for months.
His wife, UNAIDS director Winnie Byanyima, hosted Sunday’s prayer meeting at their home. She said Uganda has only a “thin veneer” of democracy.
“We are really a military state,” she told AFP. “There’s total capture of state institutions by the individual who holds military power, President Museveni.”
Police ‘not neutral’
“The police officers I have met have never looked at themselves as neutral,” said Jude Kagoro, a researcher at the University of Bremen who has spent more than a decade studying African police.
Most officers view it as their duty to support the incumbent power, he said, and often require no explicit order to use brute force on opposition rallies.
Museveni’s regime has used many strategies to infiltrate and divide opposition groups, including through handouts to different ethnic groups.
Under a system informally known as “ghetto structures,” security officials recruit young people in opposition areas who “work for the police to disorganize opposition activities, and also to spy,” said Kagoro.
The government was taken by surprise when Wine burst on to the political scene ahead of the 2021 election, becoming the voice of the urban youth, and responded with extreme violence.
Similarly, Tanzania’s authoritarian government was caught unawares when protests broke out over rigging in last October’s election, and security forces responded by killing hundreds.
The Ugandan government is better prepared now.
“For the last four-plus years, they have been building an infrastructure that can withstand any sort of pressure from the opposition,” said Kagoro.
“We are used to the military and the police on the streets during elections.”
‘Too dangerous’
Still, the authorities are not taking any chances. Citizens are being told to vote and return home immediately.
“The regime wants to make people very scared so they don’t come out to vote,” said David Lewis Rubongoya, secretary-general of Wine’s National Unity Platform.
There has been a spate of arrests and abductions targeting the opposition — a tactic also increasingly used in neighboring Kenya and Tanzania — with rights groups accusing the east African governments of coordinating their repression.
The violence makes it hard for opposition groups to organize.
“The price people have to pay for engaging in political opposition has become very high,” said Kristof Titeca, a Uganda expert based at Antwerp University.
“What’s left is a group of core supporters. Is there a grassroots opposition? No, there isn’t. It’s way too dangerous.”
