A South Korean lawmaker was attacked within the head with a blunt object in Seoul on Thursday and brought to a hospital the place she was being handled for accidents that weren’t life-threatening, in accordance with her employees and physicians.
Bae Hyunjin, of the ruling Folks Energy Occasion, is the second South Korean politician to be bodily assaulted whereas in public in lower than a month.
Yang Jaeyu, her chief of employees, mentioned that the attacker approached her asking, “Are you the Folks Energy Occasion lawmaker Bae Hyunjin?” twice earlier than hanging her with what he referred to as a “rocklike object.”
Safety digital camera footage shared by her workplace confirmed the assailant strolling via a doorway carefully behind her earlier than repeatedly hitting the lawmaker as she fell over backward onto the ground and tried to withstand the assault.
She was being handled at Soonchunhyang College Seoul Hospital, Han Dong-hoon, the chief of her social gathering, informed reporters Thursday night time.
“That is one thing that ought to by no means have occurred,” he mentioned, “and the reality wants to come back out, and the perpetrator must be dropped at justice.”
Ms. Bae, 40, a former anchorwoman for South Korean broadcaster MBC, is in her first time period as a lawmaker. She was elected in 2020. She briefly served as a spokeswoman for then-president-elect Yoon Suk Yeol after his election in 2022.
Physicians on the hospital the place she was being handled informed reporters that she was acutely aware when she arrived on the emergency room, and that she had suffered a laceration of a couple of centimeter on her head, with no vital bleeding or fractures.
The attacker was detained on the scene and being investigated by police, in accordance with Yonhap, a South Korean information company. The chief detective of the police station in Gangnam district, the place the assault occurred, couldn’t be instantly reached.
On Jan. 2, a person stabbed Lee Jae-myung, the chief of South Korea’s major opposition social gathering, within the neck because the politician made his means via a crowd. Mr. Lee was taken to the hospital and launched about eight days later. The suspect, who mentioned he was politically motivated, was arrested and anticipated to be charged with tried homicide.
In an announcement on social media, Mr. Lee referred to as Thursday’s episode “unbelievable” and mentioned, “No political terrorism of any variety is appropriate.”
Park Jung-ha, the Folks Energy Occasion’s spokeswoman, mentioned in an announcement: “In these turbulent instances of utmost politics and the politics of hate, we’re deeply involved by yet one more act of violence and political terrorism.”
The assaults, only a few weeks aside in opposition to politicians on each side of the political spectrum, might be a sign of the rising divisions and rancor which have coloured South Korean politics.
Bodily assaults on politicians have been a uncommon incidence in South Korea. The very best-profile incident was a 2006 assault on then-opposition chief Park Geun-hye, a conservative politician who later went on to win the presidency. She was slashed within the face by a person who was a fervent critic.
Choe Sang-Hun contributed reporting.
