Over one million South Koreans have taken to the streets of Seoul and other provincial cities to demand the resignation of scandal-hit President Park Geun-hye, protest organisers have claimed.

In one of the largest anti-government protests in decades, organisers said around 1.5 million people rallied in the capital Seoul on Saturday, while 400,000 people demonstrated in provincial cities.

Parents, children, university students and Buddhist monks were among those protesting for a fifth straight week, demanding that Park step down.

People beat drums and chanted "Park, get out now" as they walked towards the presidential Blue House that had been cordoned off by thousands of police.

"I came here because I wanted to show my children that people are the owner of this country, not the power holders," Shim Kyu-Il, a 47-year-old company employee, told the AFP news agency.

Al Jazeera's Harry Fawcett, reporting from Seoul, said the protest was among the largest the country had seen, and may have eclipsed the million-plus protest two weeks ago .

"If verified, this is the biggest protest in South Korean history, never mind in the course of this particular scandal," he said.

OPINION: South Korea's political morass

Park has issued public apologies over the influence-peddling scandal involving her long-time confidante Choi Soon-Sil, who has been arrested for fraud and abuse of power, but has defied repeated calls to resign.

Choi is also accused of interfering in government affairs, despite holding no official position.

The 60-year-old allegedly leveraged her relationship with Park to coerce donations from conglomerates, including SK, Lotte and Samsung, to non-profit foundations which she set up and used for personal gain.

"Park has presidential immunity while she is in office from the criminal case surrounding Choi, but the opposition is now saying they will move to impeach her next Friday or the Friday after - they will make the motion on Thursday and the vote would happen on Friday," our correspondent added.

If parliament passes the impeachment motion, Park will be suspended from official duties and replaced by the prime minister. The Constitutional Court would need to approve the impeachment.

READ MORE: Park Geun-hye: Scandal is all my fault and mistake

"Even though the Constitutional Court is deemed conservative, they would be unable to defy the people's wish to oust Park", Kang Won-Taek, a political science professor at the Seoul National University, told the AFP.

Park's approval ratings have plunged to a record low for a sitting president, as top advisers and some of South Korea's most powerful companies are caught up in the ever-widening scandal.

The headquarters of SK, Lotte and Samsung were raided by state prosecutors this week, along with the offices of the finance ministry and state pension fund.

According to the AFP, a poll this week indicated that nine out of 10 South Koreans want Park kicked out of office.</s>Around 1.3 million protesters have gathered in Seoul demanding the resignation of the South Korean President Park Geun-hye.

Organizers say they expect that number to grow to 1.5 million before the end of the night despite cold weather and snow and that a further 500,000 are gathering at various protests around the country.

The huge demonstrations, which began five weeks ago, are the largest in South Korea since the pro-democracy protests in the 1980s.

Park is embroiled in a corruption scandal involving her long-time confidante Choi Soon-sil, who has been indicted on bribery charges.

Prosecutors wish to speak to the president over allegations that she colluded with Choi to offer favors to businesses that contributed money to two foundations controlled by Choi.

The president has apologized twice on national television, but has so far resisted calls to resign. “It is hard to forgive myself and sleep at night with feelings of sorrow,” Park said of the scandal.

The leader of the main opposition party described the apology as insincere.

Opposition parties are attempting to put forward a parliamentary motion to impeach Park over the alleged collusion. The motion looks set to go to a vote in early December.

As of 8pm Saturday, The Korean Times reported 1.3 million attended the largest protest in Gwanghwamun Square in central Seoul, where activists and musicians entertained the enormous crowd.

Police said around 1,500 civic groups were involved in organizing the massive rally and that, although all previous protests have passed peacefully, 25,000 officers were required to police the event.

Earlier on Saturday, protesters marched within 200 meters of the presidential palace where Park resides, holding banners calling for her to step down.

Park was elected in 2012, and her five-year term ends in February 2018. Her father Park Chung-hee ruled South Korea from 1961, when he seized power in a military coup, until he was assassinated in 1979. He reportedly remains popular with many older Koreans, as he was in power during a period of rapid economic growth.

The current president’s approval rating, however, has fallen to as low as four percent recently – a record low for South Korea’s elected presidents.</s>SEOUL, South Korea -- Hundreds of thousands of South Koreans filled central Seoul on Saturday to demand President Park Geun-hye's resignation, the latest in a series of weekly protests against the embattled leader.

Despite cold weather and the first snow of the season, a crowd that organizers estimated at 1.5 million gathered to denounce Park, who has been accused by prosecutors of helping a friend commit extortion and is facing the possibility of impeachment within weeks.

The police estimate of the turnout was much lower, at 260,000. It was the fifth-consecutive Saturday marked by a large protest against the president.

"She promised a better life and now I know she meant it for herself," said Seo Sung-kyung, a 42-year-old restaurant worker, as she walked with fellow agitators. "We've been fooled by her. We will not make the same mistake again."

The demonstrations have been peaceful and almost festive. Street vendors sold candles, mattresses and hot snacks Saturday, and a few roadside shops gave protesters free coffee. Buddhist monks beat wooden gongs as they marched. Mothers showed up with children, or with pet dogs wrapped in padded vests, and young couples bundled in winter coats sang along as loudspeakers blared catchy tunes calling for Park's ouster.

One such song quoted from South Korea's Constitution: "The Republic of Korea shall be a democratic republic."

Prosecutors have identified Park as a criminal accomplice in the case of Choi Soon-sil, an old friend who has been charged with using her influence to coerce businesses into donating large sums to foundations that Choi controls. In news reports, Park has also been accused of letting Choi wield undue influence in state affairs.

Park, who cannot be prosecuted while in office, has apologized twice to the public over the scandal but has refused to resign as opposition lawmakers, major newspapers and some members of her own party have demanded.

Opposition parties hope to impeach her with the support of some lawmakers from her party. The National Assembly is expected to vote on an impeachment bill by Dec. 9.

No South Korean president has ever been removed from office through impeachment.

Park's approval ratings have nosedived since the scandal, falling to an all-time low of 4 percent this week, Gallup Korea said Friday. Her rating was zero percent among people in their 20s and 30s. She hasn't shown any signs of planning to step down.

The presidential office was not immediately available for comment.

"Will this stop Park and lead her down? I don't think so," said Rhee Jong-hoon, a political commentator and research fellow at Myongji University. "Her strategy is clear -- keep her presidential immunity and delay any criminal penalty. But she will attempt to restore at least some of public confidence to better fight prosecutors' accusation[s], probably through a third apology next week."

On Saturday, some protesters chanted, "Imprison Park Geun-hye!" as they marched toward the presidential Blue House. "Come out and surrender!" they shouted.

Hundreds of buses and thousands of police officers had been deployed to form barriers around the complex. One group of demonstrators was stopped just 200 yards from the presidential compound.

Protesters holding candles marched through central Seoul late into the night. Rock musicians performed on the main thoroughfare, replacing the lyrics of popular songs with phrases that criticized and ridiculed Park. Some people carried doctored images of Park in a prison uniform and handcuffed.

On smaller streets, citizens spoke to the crowd from the back of trucks. One teenage girl railed tearfully against Park for failing to respond effectively to the Sewol ferry disaster in 2014, which left more than 300 people dead, most of them teenagers.

She also criticized the government-written history textbooks that Park's administration has said it plans to issue for use in all middle and high schools starting next year.

Protesters accused Park of trying to take South Korea back to the time when it was ruled by military dictators, including her father, Park Chung-hee, and the practice of shaking down businesses was commonplace.

At one point, at the suggestion of organizers, the protesters all blew out their candles to symbolize the darkness into which, they said, Park has led the country.

Many protesters said they wanted Park to be impeached.

"What we have seen happening at the Blue House is just like a soap opera," said Kim Yong-jin, a high school senior. "We just hope that it ends like a soap opera -- with poetic justice."

Information for this article was contributed by Choe Sang-Hun of The New York Times and by Sam Kim and Kanga Kong of Bloomberg News.</s>Amid cold and snow, demonstrators filed into the streets of Seoul over the growing scandal that has engulfed her presidency and plunged the nation's government into uncertainty.

Organizers of Saturday's protest called for 2 million people to hit the streets -- no small feat for a country of 50 million. Protesters clutched umbrellas, signs and candles near the Blue House, the presidential residence, in Seoul. Organizers also had called for rallies in other cities too.

Park is accused of letting her confidante Choi Soon-sil, who does not hold an official government post, view confidential documents and presidential speeches. Choi is accused of using her relationship with Park to accumulate millions of dollars in donations to her foundations. Choi is charged with abuse of power, fraud and coercion, and two of Park's former aides also face criminal charges.

Meanwhile, Park will not be charged because the country's constitution affords the president immunity while holding office. Although Park has apologized several times, she has resisted the public pressure to resign, infuriating her critics -- who has questioned her judgment and credibility. She is set to leave office in February 2018 as she cannot run in the country's presidential election in December next year. The presidential scandal started when CNN South Korean affiliate JTBC found evidence that Choi had received secret documents on an abandoned tablet device. When Choi's father died, she succeeded him as leader of the Eternal Life Church. For years, she has given Park spiritual guidance. "It's much more than simply, 'Oh she knows this person,' it's deeply intertwined, almost like they're Rasputin and Park Geun-hye is just a puppet," David Kang, director of the Korean Studies Institute at the University of Southern California, recently told CNN. The classified information scandal, while rare and shocking in South Korea, isn't the only reason many are calling for her to step down. There has been growing frustration with Park over the past few years. Issues that angered her opponents included the stagnating economy and the Sewol ferry sinking, which killed more than 300 people. Many South Koreans were outraged at the systemic lapses that contributed to the sinking.</s>In this photo taken with a long exposure time, protesters march toward the presidential house in a candlelight procession against South Korean President Park Geun-hye in Seoul, Saturday, Nov. 26, 2016.

SEOUL, South Korea — For South Korean farmer Lee Hyo-shin, demanding the ouster of President Park Geun-hye was a slow and grueling 10-day journey atop a vehicle unable to move faster than 12 miles per hour.

He was one of hundreds of thousands of South Koreans who marched on Saturday in streets near Seoul's presidential palace, where Park is bracing for what's likely to be a bitter and prolonged fight against lawmakers who may attempt to impeach her as early as next week.

Prosecutors accuse Park of assisting criminal activities of a secretive confidante who allegedly manipulated power from the shadows and extorted companies to build an illicit fortune.

Police said 270,000 people took part in the fifth straight weekend of massive protests against the unpopular president, making it the largest rally yet. Organizers put the turnout at 1.5 million.

"The fatigue is really starting to kick in," said Lee, 53, who, while leading a convoy of farmers, traveled nearly 186 miles from the seaside county of Haenam on his tractor before police on Friday stopped the vehicles near Seoul.

"Pulling Park down isn't going to be easy, but we farmers are good at injecting energy into demonstrations," Lee said.

Thousands of people marched in streets close to the presidential Blue House, areas police usually don't permit, carrying signs and flags. Protesters later turned a darkened boulevard in front of an old palace gate into a sea of light, waving candles and singing and shouting for Park's removal.

The country's largest opposition party said it will seek to propose an impeachment motion for vote as early as Friday and no later than Dec. 9. Some members of Park's conservative party have vowed to support an impeachment attempt, arguing it would serve the party's interests to distance itself from Park ahead of next year's presidential election.

The massive rallies in recent weeks have been mostly peaceful, but there was tension Friday night as police clashed with some of hundreds of anti-Park farmers who had planned to roll into the capital on tractors and trucks, injuring several farmers.

Lee and other members of the Korean Peasant League had departed from two towns in the country's southwest and southeast on Nov. 15 and 16, creating a duo of crawling motorcades that inspired Mad Max comparisons on the internet. Police blocked the vehicles after a court ruled that the farmers shouldn't be allowed to park or drive them in rally areas.</s>South Korean President Park Geun-hye is facing increasing pressure to resign as hundreds of thousands of demonstrators join nationwide protests over corruption claims.

In what is believed to be one of the largest demonstrations so far over the allegations engulfing Ms Park, organisers said 1.3 million protesters filled the streets in the capital of Seoul on Saturday evening, with 1.5 million estimated to join by the end of the night.

Some 500,000 people are expected to turn out in other regions. Police put the number of participants in Seoul at 260,000.

The demonstrations mark the fifth straight weekend of protests in the country and are among the largest seen in South Korea since the pro-democracy protests of the 1980s.

Farmers, university students and Buddhist monks were among the demonstrators, who beat drums and chanted "Park get out now", as they marched towards the Presidential Blue House, which had been cordoned over by 24,000 police.

The president is bracing for an impeachment push by opposition parties and some members of her own Saenuri Party amid allegations she let her long-time confidante Choi Soon-Sil, who has been arrested for fraud and abuse of power, influence government affairs and amass an illicit fortune despite holding no official position - a scandal critics say undermines the country's democracy.

Sixty-year-old Ms Choi allegedly used her relationship with Ms Park to drive donations from conglomerates, including SK, Lotte and Samsung, to non-profit foundations, which she set up and used for personal gain.

Ms Park has issued two public apologies over the scandal, which have only served to fuel public anger and suspicion, but has resisted repeated calls to resign.

She has promised to submit herself to an expanding probe by prosecutors as well as a separate investigation by an independent special prosecutor to be appointed by parliament.

The headquarters of SK, Lotte and Samsung were raided by state prosecutors this week along with the offices of the finance ministry and state pension fund.

At the rally in Seoul, protesters wearing raincoats and armed with umbrellas against the cold, wet weather, waved placards and lit candles as night descended.

Buddhist monks wearing grey robes recited a sutra while other protestors imitated Ms Park, Ms Choi and Samsung scion Lee Jae-Yong being led into prison.

"I don't think Park would step down voluntarily, but we need to raise our voice as much as possible to encourage parliament to push through with its move to impeach her," Lee Sung-Cheol a 23-year-old student told AFP.

"I came here because I wanted to show my children that people are the owner of this country, not the power holders," Shim Ku-Il, a 47-year-old company employee said.

Kwak Bo-youn, 45, said: "I was watching the news and thought this cannot go on - people really want her to step down but she hasn't. This is the second time for me to the protests, but the first time for my husband and kids".

Ms Park's approval ratings have plummeted since the allegations emerged. After hovering at just five per cent for three consecutive weeks her approval rating dipped one percentage point on Friday.

According to a poll by Gallup Korea, her disapproval rating has risen three percentage points to 93 per cent. Her lowest approval rating is among young people, with 99 per cent of 19 to 29 year-olds disapproving of the president.

A parliamentary vote to impeach Ms Park, whose five year term ends in February 2018, could take place as early as next week as an increasing number of ruling party politicians back the opposition-led campaign to remove her from office.

If parliament passes the impeachment motion, Ms Park would be suspended from official duties and replaced by the prime minister. The Constitutional Court would need to approve the impeachment.</s>SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — South Korea’s embattled president accepted the resignation of her justice minister on Monday, the latest in a series of personnel reshuffles she’s made amid a political scandal that’s threatening her leadership.

Justice Minister Kim Hyun-woong and a senior presidential adviser offered to resign last week after prosecutors directly linked President Park Geun-hye to alleged misdeeds by her jailed shadowy confidante at the center of the scandal.

Park’s office said in a statement Monday that she had accepted Kim’s resignation but withheld the one by her adviser.

Park has already fired eight of her presidential aides and nominated a new prime minister to try to regain public trust. But South Koreans have staged massive rallies in Seoul for five straight weekends, calling for her ouster.

Opposition lawmakers have said they’ll push for Park’s parliamentary impeachment by early December because she hasn’t acceded to their request to step down voluntarily. The floor leaders of three main opposition parties are to meet Wednesday to determine when to submit an impeachment motion, according to the Democratic Party, the largest opposition party.

If Park is impeached, she’ll be immediately deprived of her presidential powers until the Constitutional Court can rule on her fate. The court has up to 180 days to make a decision.

At the heart of the scandal is Choi Soon-sil, Park’s longtime friend and the daughter of a late cult leader who allegedly meddled in state affairs and pressured companies to donate millions of dollars to foundations controlled by her at the request of Park.

Prosecutors have so far indicted Choi, two ex-presidential officials and a music video director known as a Choi associate for extortion, leakage of confidential documents and other charges.

Park, who has immunity from prosecution while in office, is refusing to meet with prosecutors. Her lawyer, Yoo Yeong-ha, has described prosecutors’ accusations against Park as groundless. He said Monday that Park would not accept a fresh request by prosecutors to undergo questioning on Tuesday.</s>In this Saturday, Nov. 5, 2016 photo, South Korean protesters stage a rally calling for South Korean President Park Geun-hye to step down in downtown Seoul, South Korea. South Korea is seeing its biggest wave of street demonstrations in decades but nobody is sure how many people are taking to the streets each week. At first media relied on two sources - the police and the organizer. But they have been accused of underestimating or overestimating the crowds in the previous four Saturdays (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon, File)

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — South Korea is seeing its biggest wave of street demonstrations in decades but nobody is sure how many people are taking to the streets each week.

For the fifth-straight weekend, masses of protesters are expected to occupy major avenues in downtown Seoul on Saturday demanding the ouster of President Park Geun-hye. She is suspected of helping in the criminal activities of a secretive confidante who is accused of manipulating government affairs and extorting companies to build an illicit fortune.

The rally is certain to renew what has become a weekly back-and-forth between police and protest organizers, whose crowd estimates have differed widely in the previous four Saturdays.

There are many challenges for counting the number of protesters. The rallies stretch from midday to late night — some people stay for several hours, others just several minutes. The demonstrators not only gather in open space but also small alleys and between buildings. Some of them are constantly moving.

Here's a look at how police and protest organizers size the crowds at protests, and also how South Korean scientists and a technology company are exploring new ways to more accurately measure the number of protesters:

While the protest in Seoul on Nov. 12 might have been the largest since South Korea freed itself from dictatorship three decades ago, it's unclear how big it actually was. Police saw the crowd at 260,000, while organizers say 1 million turned out.

For the police, the aim is to measure the maximum crowd occupying a certain space at any given time so that they could determine the size of police personnel and resources to deploy, according to an official from the Seoul Metropolitan Police Agency, who didn't want to be named, citing office rules.

Police presume that, when sitting, six people would fill a space of 3.3 square meters (35.52 sq. feet), or 1 "pyeong," the aerial unit commonly used in South Korea. The same area would hold nine or 10 people when standing, police said.

Based on this, police consider the 32,100-square-meter (345,525-sq. feet) boulevard in front of the Gwanghwamun palace gate, which has been the center of the protests, as accommodating close to 600,000 people when fully packed.

Critics say the police model understates the actual number of demonstrators because it fails to track people moving in and out of the area during the duration of the protest, and is ill-equipped to measure protesters in non-open space, such as sidewalks and alleys between buildings.

ORGANIZERS: TRACKING EVERYONE WHO CAME AND WENT

Han Seon-beom, one of the protest organizers, admits outright that their measurements aren't scientific, but still argues they are more reliable than police numbers.

Organizers seek to track the entire flow of people from the protest's start to its finish. They collect estimates given by counters deployed at different locations to size up the crowds in each area and update the numbers throughout the duration of the protest.

They try to account for the people on the sidewalks, spaces between buildings and also those moving in and out of nearby subway stations and restaurants, Han said.

The numbers of participants reported by organized groups, such as labor unions, are also put into account.

"What you try to do is to count the first 1,000, like the first 20 rows of 50 people, and that gives you an idea of how many people you are seeing," said Han.

One South Korean retail analytics company measured the number of protesters by counting the number of smartphone signals.

Zoyi Corp. deployed about 60 people, each carrying a backpack with the company's Wi-Fi signal-detecting sensor, to the rally on Nov. 19.

They collected Wi-Fi and Bluetooth signals from smartphones for about seven hours from 2 p.m. at 53 spots and found about 369,372 smartphones that had their wireless signals on during the rally.

The company presumed that about half of smartphone users usually leave their Wi-Fi feature on and the other half switch it off, based on a separate survey on smartphone usage. It also assumed that about 20 percent of the smartphone signals were repetition from the same device. Based on this, Zoyi concluded that about 738,700 people joined the rally.

"The limitation of our method is that it can measure only those who kept their phones' Wi-Fi signals on," said An Nahyun, the company's chief operating officer. SCIENTISTS LOOK AT PARTICLE PHYSICS AND MORE Some scientists strived to improve accuracy by drawing methods from their own field. In general, they conclude that the protests must be larger than the police estimates. Park Inkyu, a particle physicist, counted the number of people by applying a method that scientists use to measure particles in high energy physics, writing a code that counted the number of candle lights based on pictures from the rally. Based on his own observation at the past rallies, Park assumed that at least half of the demonstrators did not bring a candle. He added the number of candles in the photo to the possible number of people without a candle and drew a conclusion that about four people were occupying 1 square meter (11 sq. feet) at the rally. That means that the number of people occupying avenues, streets and alleys near the presidential office could range from 500,000 to 700,000 when the areas are packed, he said. The limitation of Park's estimate is that it cannot count the candles hidden behind other people or objects. Another scientist suggested a way of measuring the crowds' movement. Assuming that about 10 percent of the area at the rally is used as passageways for people who are moving, and also assuming that each person moves every 0.3 second, the number of people who came and left the Nov. 12 protest would have been three times larger than the police estimate, according to Won Byung Mook, a science and engineering professor at Sungkyunkwan University. Won said scientists need more data to make their estimates more precise. "There are many limitations in this method because it is based on assumption, not on vetted data," he said. Follow Kim Tong-hyung at https://twitter.com/KimTongHyung and Youkyung Lee at https://twitter.com/YKLeeAP</s>For the fifth-straight weekend, masses of protesters are expected to occupy major avenues in downtown Seoul on Saturday demanding the ouster of President Park Geun-hye. She is suspected of helping in the criminal activities of a secretive confidante who is accused of manipulating government affairs and extorting companies to build an illicit fortune.

There are many challenges for counting the number of protesters. The rallies stretch from midday to late night — some people stay for several hours, others just several minutes. The demonstrators not only gather in open space but also small alleys and between buildings. Some of them are constantly moving.

While the protest in Seoul on Nov. 12 might have been the largest since South Korea freed itself from dictatorship three decades ago, it's unclear how big it actually was. Police saw the crowd at 260,000, while organizers say 1 million turned out.

For the police, the aim is to measure the maximum crowd occupying a certain space at any given time so that they could determine the size of police personnel and resources to deploy, according to an official from the Seoul Metropolitan Police Agency, who didn't want to be named, citing office rules.

Critics say the police model understates the actual number of demonstrators because it fails to track people moving in and out of the area during the duration of the protest, and is ill-equipped to measure protesters in non-open space, such as sidewalks and alleys between buildings.

Organizers seek to track the entire flow of people from the protest's start to its finish. They collect estimates given by counters deployed at different locations to size up the crowds in each area and update the numbers throughout the duration of the protest.

They try to account for the people on the sidewalks, spaces between buildings and also those moving in and out of nearby subway stations and restaurants, Han said.

"What you try to do is to count the first 1,000, like the first 20 rows of 50 people, and that gives you an idea of how many people you are seeing," said Han.

The company presumed that about half of smartphone users usually leave their Wi-Fi feature on and the other half switch it off, based on a separate survey on smartphone usage. It also assumed that about 20 of the smartphone signals were repetition from the same device. Based on this, Zoyi concluded that about 738,700 people joined the rally.

Based on his own observation at the past rallies, Park assumed that at least half of the demonstrators did not bring a candle. He added the number of candles in the photo to the possible number of people without a candle and drew a conclusion that about four people were occupying 1 square meter (11 sq. feet) at the rally.

That means that the number of people occupying avenues, streets and alleys near the presidential office could range from 500,000 to 700,000 when the areas are packed, he said. The limitation of Park's estimate is that it cannot count the candles hidden behind other people or objects.</s>Hundreds of thousands of angry citizens have been taking to the streets every weekend in South Korea, against the continuation in office of President Park Geun-hye. The crisis of confidence in Ms. Park’s leadership exploded after her aide Choi Soon-sil was arrested over allegations that Ms. Choi covertly exercised illegal authority over critical government decisions. She has also allegedly extorted $69 million from the giant industrial conglomerates, or chaebols, in the form of donations to two charitable foundations. Ms. Park has stood her ground and clung on to the presidency, even as she sacked at least eight of her aides in an unsuccessful attempt to regain public trust. Yet, pressure is mounting as the opposition parties are circling the wagons over impeaching her for breach of the Constitution. An impeachment motion would require two-thirds support in the 300-seat National Assembly. Opposition parties enjoy a combined majority there, and say they have secured the backing of more than 29 lawmakers of the ruling Saenuri party, the minimum number required to push this through. If they succeed, this would be the first time in 12 years that South Korea’s National Assembly has impeached a president.

History also matters in the broader context of the unravelling relationship between the South Korean government and the chaebols. What began as a storied macroeconomic strategy of “picking winners” from amongst competing industrial groups, a paradigm that produced the Samsungs and Hyundais of today, is under a cloud. On November 8, prosecutors raided the Samsung offices over allegations it had transferred $3.1 million to a company owned by Ms. Choi in Germany. The hard-fought democracy that South Koreans won in 1987, driven by “people power” protests similar to the ones seen in Seoul this month, is in need of revitalisation. The pressure to establish a more sustainable model of governance is immense, not least because South Korea finds itself at a strategic crossroads on the global stage. Whoever succeeds Ms. Park as President — and it might well be soon-to-retire UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon — would have to address sky-high tensions with nuclear-armed North Korea, and manage an economy that is at risk of slowing. Ties are cooling with China, South Korea’s largest trading partner, and Beijing is hostile to the prospect of deploying the U.S.-made antiballistic missile system THAAD in the peninsula. Further, the rhetoric of U.S. President-elect Donald Trump on economic protectionism and reviewing relationships with treaty allies does not help the South Korean cause. One way or another, the ball is in Ms. Park’s court, and she has the opportunity to bring the turmoil to a quick end.
South Koreans take to the streets en masse demanding the resignation of President Park Geun-hye amidst a corruption scandal. Around 1.5 million people rallied in the capital Seoul, while another 400,000 people demonstrated in provincial cities.