'Tough mom' beats girl during Gwanghwamun protest

Joo Ok-soon

By Ko Dong-hwan

A leader of an ultra-right-wing civic group comprising married women known as “platoon of moms” attacked a high school student during a large-scale protest held at Gwanghwamun Square on Saturday.

Joo Ok-soon, 63, struck the girl’s face multiple times at around 5:20 p.m. during the demonstration that attracted around 200,000 protesters demanding the resignation of President Park Geun-hye for her involvement in an influence-peddling scandal with her longtime confidant Choi Soon-sil.

Witnesses of the alleged assault took Joo to the Jongno police. The police questioned her on the charge of physical violence.

Joo explained that she attacked the girl because the student took her picture without permission. She added the student also hit her back two to three times.

The student, identified by surname Kim, however, said on Facebook that she did not hit Joo.

“Joo first took a picture of me protesting and asked me whether I had no parents,” Kim said. “I got angry at what she said and snatched the picket she was holding. She immediately slapped me.”

“Platoon of moms” had made emotionally provocative arguments against those with interests in some of the biggest social issues in the past.

They had insisted that Korea must stop criticizing Japan in regards to the historic issue of “comfort women” -- Korean and other girls forced into sexual slavery for Japanese soldiers during World War II -- and forgive the country. The activists had said, “Even if our daughters or mothers were the victims, our stance would not have changed.” They have even asked surviving elderly victims of the war crime who have been demanding the Japanese government’s official apology to “give up.”

The group had also clashed with the families of 300 victims -- mostly high school students -- of the Sewol ferry sinking in 2014 who protested the government to take proper measures to find the accident’s exact cause and punish those responsible. The counter-protesters had questioned why the families were protesting so hard for the dead who were not even patriots who died for a national cause.

Joo had also argued in favor of conducting an autopsy on the late farmer Baek Nam-ki, who died in September after being in a coma for 10 months, following a long conflict between his bereaved family members and the authorities. He was knocked over by a police water cannon last year at a labor rally.

Appearing at Seoul National University Hospital, where Baek’s memorial altar had been set up, Joo questioned Baek’s family members, saying that a bruise on his forehead and broken bones cannot be explained by the water cannon.