In his inauguration speech in May 2022, Yoon Suk Yeol promised that as president of South Korea he would ‘rebuild this great nation’ and make it a nation that ‘truly belongs to the people’.

Instead, his presidency has been marked by political dysfunction and growing populism amid scandals, and discontent peaked on Tuesday when he declared martial law in the country for the first time in more than four decades.

Yoon, who came to power with a low approval rating and an opposition-dominated parliament, has faced serious challenges from the start of his term.

The 63-year-old former prosecutor, who played a key role in the prosecution of former presidents Park Geun-hye and Lee Myung-bak, had never played a political role before announcing his candidacy for the 2021 presidential election.

Yoon was appointed attorney general in 2019 by his predecessor, the liberal Moon Jae-in, but their relationship soured after Yoon launched an investigation into Moon’s justice minister, and Yoon’s public profile rose significantly. After stepping down in March 2021, Yoon secured the presidential nomination of the conservative People Power Party.

In the following year’s election, he triumphed over his liberal rival by just 0.73 per cent – the narrowest margin in South Korean presidential elections.

As Yoon struggled to pass legislation through the opposition-controlled parliament, his favored cabinet nominees also struggled to win approval, and four were forced to withdraw amid allegations of corruption.

The difficulties continued as Yoon tried to pass legislation. By January 2024, only 29 per cent of the bills submitted by his government to parliament had been passed.

Yoon responded by using his presidential veto to overturn opposition-backed legislation, vetoing more bills than any of his predecessors since the end of military rule in 1987.

Early in his term, he made a point of answering journalists’ questions informally. But his relationship with the media soured as he targeted critical reporting, and police and prosecutors repeatedly cracked down on those who published ‘fake news’.

Another public relations setback came when Yoon announced plans to move his office from the historic Blue House palace in central Seoul to the defense ministry complex. Yoon had hoped the more down-to-earth working environment would make him more accessible to the public, but he faced a backlash over the cost of implementing the plan.

Yoon, who also faced problems on education, had to abandon his plan for children to start school a year earlier. And other battles in critical policy areas such as health led to a lengthy strike by doctors over pay and conditions.

Yoon’s waning popularity was further underlined in April’s parliamentary elections, which saw the opposition Democratic Party regain a large majority.

Opposition lawmakers have since called for an investigation into Yoon’s wife over allegations that she had an improper relationship with the owner of a polling company. Yoon has vehemently denied the allegations.

As the resistance in parliament continued, Yoon became increasingly frustrated, especially with the opposition’s refusal to pass the president’s proposed annual budget.

“The Democratic Party’s legislative dictatorship… is even using the budget as a tool of political struggle,” Yoon said in his martial law declaration speech on Tuesday.

Hours later, he said he planned to lift the ’emergency martial law’ measure after lawmakers voted for it in parliament, making his own position even more uncertain amid one of the most serious constitutional crises in South Korea’s modern history.

Not well received at home, but in the West

With his approval ratings falling at home, Yoon has received a warmer reception in the West. Most notably, he entertained President Joe Biden during a state visit to Washington in April last year by singing the 1970s song American Pie.

Yoon was also the first South Korean president to attend a NATO meeting and has deepened military and security cooperation with the U.S. and Japan, while providing significant aid to Ukraine.

This drew criticism from the opposition, which accused him of provoking China, the country’s main trading partner.

Unlike his predecessor Moon, who favored dialogue with North Korea, Yoon has taken a harder line against Pyongyang, prompting North Korea to respond with more missile tests.

Noor Jallal Jalali, the Taliban’s minister of public health, has traveled to China at a time when the Taliban had just announced medical education for women to be banned across Afghanistan.

Jalali would take part in a bilateral health meeting in China aimed at bolstering up cooperation between the two countries.

Taliban spokesman for the health ministry, Sharafat Zaman Amarkhil called the purpose of the visit to “strengthen bilateral cooperation in the areas of health sectors.”

This comes when the Taliban supreme leader in a fresh decree had banned medical education in Afghanistan, closing the last remaining institutions where women can learn.

Following the announcement, the Afghan female students in medical schools across Afghanistan protest the decision, saying they will stand against this decision.

In one heart-wrenching video circulating in social media, female students in Afghanistan’s Kapisa province weep as a Taliban official announces that they are no longer allowed to continue their studies and orders them to go back home.

The door of education closed to the Afghan women and girls

Despite the closure of universities and schools for girls, they continued to study in private health institutes and were trained in fields such as midwifery, pharmacy, laboratory, x-ray, physiotherapy, nursing and dental prosthetics.

One of the heads of a private medical institution said that they received notice from the ministry of public health to freeze education for the girls. “We were called by the Taliban health officials and read the Taliban supreme leader’s decree and told us that from today on no women and girls are allowed to enter health institutes,” he said without revealing his name.

Speaking on condition of anonymity, he told Harici that the health ministry called a number of owners of private health institutions without revealing the agenda of the meeting. “During the meeting, the health officials said that from now on no female should attend medical classes.” He said that most of the students were women and young girls, but from today (Tuesday) they are banned from education.

Taliban health minister visits China to standardize Afghanistan’s healthcare system

He said that the majority of students were women, lamenting on the current situation, he said that girls and women are banned from “last hope” of education. He said that women and girls came to the medical institutes following the ban of schools above six grades, but now this is also banned.

Meanwhile, Robert Dickson, Charge d’Affaires of the UK Mission to Afghanistan, expressed deep concern about new reports that the Taliban will deny medical education to women in Afghanistan.

“This is another affront to women’s right to education and will further restrict access to healthcare for Afghan women and children,” he said.

Taliban spokesman Amarkhil said that minister Jalali is also expected to hold meetings with senior Chinese health officials during his trip.

He put the purpose of the visit to seek “standardize Afghanistan’s healthcare system” and promote comprehensive partnerships with international organizations to address the country’s pressing health needs.

The World Health Organization (WHO) in its recent report said that Taliban policies limiting women’s participation in aid organizations, especially in healthcare, have significantly impacted women’s access to medical services. 

In a bid to expand globally, Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI), the country’s top-selling defense group, is jointly looking for start-ups in India for cutting-edge technologies in areas such as big data, signal and image processing, green energy and more.

IAI launched the NeuSPHERE Innovation Accelerator Programme in the South Asian country at the end of November.

Avital Schrift, IAI’s vice president of core technologies, told Nikkei Asia in New Delhi that the aim of the programme is to “reach out to innovative startups in the deep technology space and work with this community to take their ideas and … turn immature ideas from the world’s technologies into products”.

In addition to big data, image processing and green energy, the IAI will also focus on advanced navigation systems, artificial intelligence, and autonomy, XR (augmented reality) care and training, advanced manufacturing, quantum, edge computing, human-machine interfaces, and wearable technology.

The company works with many Indian government organizations and private companies in various fields, such as Hindustan Aeronautics and Larsen & Toubro. In September, it signed a memorandum of understanding with India’s state-owned defense company Bharat Electronics to work together to meet the short-range air defense needs of the South Asian country’s armed forces.

We are working with all the giants [in India] and … [we are also] trying to create a lot of joint ventures … We believe in cooperation with Indian companies,’ Schrift said in the interview.

IAI said the NeuSPHERE programme will provide participating Indian startups with access to advanced resources and technologies, including global mentorship and guidance, networking, and funding to accelerate their market-ready solutions.

“We have our own innovation center in Israel that has been operating for the past four years,” said Schrift, adding that when they decided to go global, they focused on only two giants: The U.S. and India. The Israeli company launched an innovation programme called IAI CATALYST in the U.S. earlier this year.

“We value Indian culture, talent and technological capabilities,” said Schrift, who has been working with Indians for 40 years.

Israeli Ambassador to New Delhi Reuven Azar told Nikkei that the IAI’s NeuSPHERE programme is ‘a very important programme because innovation plays a key role in creating the value chain in the economy’.

“Everything starts with innovation and then flows down,” he added. IAI also inaugurated its latest facility in the southern Indian city of Hyderabad on Thursday, specializing in the maintenance and repair of radar modules and subsystems such as power systems, cooling systems, information technology integration, radar testing and calibration.

The strategic center marks an important milestone in IAI’s commitment to strengthen India’s defense infrastructure under the Make in India initiative, which aims to transform the South Asian country into a manufacturing hub, IAI said in a statement.

Founded in 1953, IAI is the largest technology employer in Israel with revenues of $5 billion and 15,000 employees. It is one of the world’s top 10 aircraft design and manufacturing companies and one of the world’s top 11 satellite companies.