Opposition slams Yoon's suggestion to send offensive weapons to Ukraine

South Korea's main opposition party lawmakers on Friday rallied in the halls of the National Assembly to condemn President Yoon Suk Yeol for his proposed shift in Ukraine aid policy in response to North Korean troop deployment by Russia.

“The Yoon administration is reportedly considering providing ‘offensive weapons’ to Ukraine in the wake of Russia’s deployment of North Korean troops. This is an incredibly dangerous idea that treats people’s lives like pawns in a game of chess,” Democratic Party of Korea floor leader Rep. Park Chan-dae said.

Park also said the president “shouldn’t engage South Korea in a proxy war with North Korea to cause conflict in a faraway land,” and “risk starting a military conflict on the Korean Peninsula.”

Also speaking at the rally, Rep. Park Jie-won, who was formerly the National Intelligence Service director for Yoon's predecessor, liberal former President Moon Jae-in, blamed Yoon for "destroying inter-Korean relations," thereby pushing North Korea toward Russia instead of bringing it towards the US through exchange and cooperation.

“I repeat, for the sake of world peace: North Korea should immediately stop sending troops to Russia and bring back the troops that are already there,” he said.

The protest came in response to Yoon's comment Thursday, in a joint press conference with Polish President Andrzej Duda that the policy of not providing Ukraine with lethal weapons could be reconsidered with flexibility, depending on North Korea's next move.

On the Democratic Party protesting Yoon’s response to North Korea sending troops to fight for Russia, an official of the presidential office said Friday that they should be “condemning Pyongyang instead of Seoul.”

In a separate statement, some Democratic Party lawmakers called on Army general-turned-lawmaker Rep. Han Ki-ho to step down over his Telegram conversation with Shin Won-sik, national security adviser to Yoon.

Han was caught by a press camera Thursday during a meeting of the Assembly's National Defense Committee messaging Shin that if South Korea "cooperates with Ukraine, we can bomb and hit North Korean military units with missiles to cause damage and use that as psychological warfare against North Korea."