South Korea presidential ouster part of Chinese strategy to 'expand its regional influence,' expert says

In a week that saw French right-wing person Marine Le Pen banned from moving for office, the South Korean Constitutional Court's ouster of President Yoon Suk Yeol from bureau connected Friday has critics looking towards Beijing’s manus successful efforts to region the person from power.

"Yoon’s overseas and information policies basal successful stark opposition to the pro-China figures agelong supported and controlled by the [Chinese Communist Party (CCP)]," Anna Mahjar-Barducci, Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI) task director, told Fox News Digital. She explained that those policies "posed a menace to Beijing’s semipermanent strategy of cultivating a pro-China faction successful South Korea,"

Mahjar-Barducci claimed the CCP has utilized "overt economical cooperation, governmental donations, covert payment transfers and adjacent amerciable intersexual bribery" to cultivate "certain South Korean governmental figures implicit time, aiming to undermine the U.S.-South Korea alliance, weaken South Korea’s strategical independency and grow its determination power astatine the disbursal of the U.S." 

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Supporters of impeached South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol signifier a rally to reason his impeachment successful Seoul, South Korea, connected March 8. (AP)

Mahjar-Barducci besides claimed that 1 Korean activistic who spoke to her connected Friday told her that predetermination fraud successful South Korea had been organized successful practice with China, whose authorities had unduly influenced the past 2 wide elections. 

The Associated Press reported connected Friday that supporters of the ousted president were enraged by the decision. Kim Min-seon, a Yoon supporter, is quoted arsenic saying it was the lone mode to woody with liberals blocking Yoon’s efforts to combat Pyongyang and Beijing’s campaigns to endanger South Korea’s ideology done cyberattacks, disinformation and exertion theft — thing denied by the absorption party. 

Yoon had agelong provoked the ire of North Korean dictator Kim Jong-un implicit his plans to summation his country’s atomic capacity. The erstwhile South Korean person sought accrued cooperation with the U.S. arsenic a deterrent to the North Korean threat.

A spokesperson from the Chinese embassy successful Washington D.C. did not reply Fox News Digital questions connected allegations the state interferes successful Seoul's politics. Questions sent to the South Korean embassy were not returned. 

CHINA LAUNCHES LARGE MILITARY DRILLS AROUND TAIWAN TO ISSUE ‘SEVERE WARNING’

Chinese President Xi Jinping meets with South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol connected the sidelines of the 31st APEC Economic Leaders' Meeting successful Lima, Peru, connected Nov. 15, 2024. (Ding Lin/Xinhua via Getty Images)

Mahjar-Barducci besides explained that fixed the "intensive sum by Beijing’s media" of Yoon’s dismissal, the CCP is "brimming with pride" and "extremely pleased" with the crook of events. Beijing "has already taken down 2 pro-American South Korean presidents, Park Geun-hye and Yoon Suk Yeol, which shows conscionable however heavy Beijing’s infiltration and power successful South Korea are," she said.

"South Korea needs to beryllium the strongest ally, on with Japan, of America," Mahjar-Barducci continued. But Beijing is poising itself to "win implicit this important strategical area," which the U.S. "cannot spend to lose."

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China’s Shandong craft bearer is seen adjacent Taiwan connected March 31. (Taiwan Ministry of National Defense via AP)

Mahjar-Barducci said Yoon's removal is portion of a "pattern… each implicit the world" of right-wing candidates being forbidden from seeking election, including Romanian right-wing statesmanlike frontrunner Călin Georgescu and French right-wing person Le Pen. "The judiciary has been weaponized erstwhile again," she explained.

The CCP’s manus successful South Korea comes astatine a clip erstwhile Beijing is holding large-scale subject drills astir Taiwan, with 19 vessels from the Chinese navy being spotted successful the waters surrounding Taiwan betwixt Monday and Tuesday morning. Mahjar-Barducci said that portion Beijing has attempted to marque specified drills "a caller normal," it has besides warned that the "drills could unexpectedly crook into a existent war."

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South Korea volition clasp elections for a caller president successful 2 months. Fox News Digital has reported that surveys amusement wide absorption Democratic Party person Lee Jae-myung is "an aboriginal favorite" for the position.