From the start, with the grief nonetheless uncooked and anguished questions unanswered, the South Korean authorities distanced itself from the catastrophe that unfolded final yr on a Halloween weekend in Seoul.
Practically 160 revelers had been crushed to loss of life in a slim alleyway within the Itaewon neighborhood, after large throngs had amassed with no cops to manage them, regardless of official warnings that the gathering could be unusually massive after the top of pandemic restrictions.
Over the times that adopted, in a response that drew scorn and mock amongst many South Koreans, the federal government insisted that it didn’t have accountability for public security on the streets that evening as a result of the Halloween festivities had not been formally organized. As an alternative, the federal government blamed native police and different officers for failing to cope with the emergency.
Now, with one other Halloween approaching, the households say far too little has been finished to verify such a disaster doesn’t occur once more.
Whereas bar and nightclub house owners in Itaewon have determined to not promote Halloween-themed occasions this yr, they’re hopeful {that a} sizable crowd will end up and bolster confidence within the neighborhood, whose leisure space turned a ghost city within the months after the catastrophe. Officers have banned Halloween festivities in Hongdae, one other standard drink-and-party neighborhood in Seoul, to assist stop congestion-related accidents. Hongdae was anticipated to draw extra crowds this yr if folks shunned Itaewon for Halloween.
Metropolis officers say they’re taking additional safety precautions. Seoul has begun including a whole lot of high-resolution surveillance cameras and plans to make use of artificial-intelligence expertise to look at crowds in Itaewon and different leisure zones. Officers say they plan to ship as much as 300 officers and cops to Itaewon and preserve a battalion of cops on standby to intervene if streets turn out to be congested. They’ll open an advert hoc management heart there to watch the group. And so they have modified avenue tiles to make Itaewon’s sloping alleyways much less slippery.
However the households of the catastrophe victims say an underlying reason for the calamity stays unaddressed: a paperwork that fails to prioritize public security and refuses to return clear on its shortcomings, shielding politically appointed bosses in a deeply hierarchical tradition.
“The entire authorities was united in attempting to push this case below the floor,” mentioned Lee Jeong-min, who misplaced a daughter in Itaewon and leads a marketing campaign by victims’ households for justice. “One factor we realized up to now yr is that no security system issues until you might have a authorities with a way of accountability.”
Within the aftermath of the deaths, the federal government of President Yoon Suk Yeol ordered officers to cease calling the group crush a “catastrophe” and its casualties “victims,” referring to them as an “accident” and “the lifeless.” And Mr. Yoon ignored calls for from victims’ households to set an instance by firing prime security officers, and dismissed requests for a gathering and an apology.
A invoice that will categorically stipulate that it’s the authorities’s responsibility to organize security measures when massive teams of persons are anticipated to assemble with out organizers has but to clear the Nationwide Meeting.
Opposition lawmakers and kin of the victims are additionally pushing for a particular regulation to open an impartial investigation into the catastrophe, after Mr. Yoon’s authorities allowed the Nationwide Police Company to analyze itself within the Itaewon case.
The households’ worst fears had been confirmed when the police company cleared its personal prime bosses and people on the Ministry of the Inside and Security of any wrongdoing, whereas prosecutors indicted 12 native police and different officers on prices corresponding to negligence of official responsibility. No verdicts have come because the trials have dragged on. Investigators requested prosecutors to indict the Seoul police chief on related prices, however the prosecutors have but to behave.
The households say that high-level officers needs to be punished to clarify that they bear accountability in large-scale disasters just like the Itaewon crush, and that structural adjustments to forestall such calamities can be potential provided that the complete reality of what occurred is uncovered.
On the evening of Oct. 29, particular person after panicked particular person referred to as police and fireplace division hotlines for hours, reporting a harmful crowd surge creating within the cramped alleyway in Itaewon. Finally, a whole lot of individuals started to fall on prime of one another as waves of revelers pushed up and down the sloping strip of pavement, jostling to go in reverse instructions.
Because the partygoers had been suffocating and dying, a whole lot of cops deployed for different duties had been lower than a mile away. The fireplace division’s nearest first-response heart was 660 ft away. The closest police station was even nearer: 330 ft away. However the determined calls from anxious passers-by went unheeded for hours.
After the catastrophe, Mr. Yoon mentioned he felt “an indescribable disappointment” on the deaths of the 159 folks, together with 26 foreigners, most of their 20s and 30s. His authorities vowed to make the nation safer.
However its unpreparedness in dealing with emergencies was uncovered once more this yr when floodwaters crammed an underpass in July, killing 14 drivers and passengers, and when the World Scout Jamboree descended into chaos in August. In each circumstances, officers did not heed warnings of hazard.
Within the Itaewon disaster, the households requested whether or not the police had been too preoccupied with guarding the neighborhood of Mr. Yoon’s workplace, which he had moved close by. On the day of the group crush, 1000’s of officers had been deployed to watch peaceable anti-Yoon demonstrators, a daily prevalence in Seoul. Dozens of plainclothes cops had been in Itaewon — to hold out Mr. Yoon’s conflict on medicine, to not management the group.
The authorities’ declare that they lacked a mandate to control the crowds as a result of the festivities had no organizers was “an excuse,” mentioned Ha Kag-Cheon, an professional in catastrophe prevention at U1 College, a non-public college in central South Korea. “It’s a fundamental responsibility of the authorities to make preparations and guarantee security when a big crowd is anticipated.”
After the catastrophe, bars and nightclubs closed as folks shunned Itaewon, a neighborhood within the central Yongsan district the place foreigners and locals have lengthy gathered for the celebration environment. Some house owners moved their companies elsewhere in Seoul. Those that remained organized flea markets and indie-band nights to assist deliver prospects again. The federal government offered low cost loans and 20 % low cost coupons to guests.
At this time, Itaewon golf equipment have regained 60 to 70 % of their enterprise, mentioned Yoo Tae-Hyuk, who runs a membership close to the catastrophe alleyway and leads an affiliation of Itaewon retailer house owners.
Throughout a latest weekend night, younger nightclub staff in black T-shirts had been out engaging passers-by. Folks sipped beer round veranda tables, having fun with a cool October night. From a bar floated Pharrell Williams’s music “Comfortable.”
“We now have to vary folks’s notion of Itaewon as a scary place, a spot they’re afraid to go to,” mentioned Hwang Quickly-Jae, who runs jazz and rock ’n’ roll bars.
The alleyway nonetheless stands as a monument to the tragedy. On a rust-colored steel wall at its entrance, a whole lot of handwritten messages from residents and guests from world wide mourn the lifeless. “I hope we are able to take steps to forestall this sort of tragedy from ever taking place once more,” one message mentioned.
That wall, which investigators mentioned a neighborhood lodge added to its facet years in the past with out permission, made the alleyway much more cramped. The lodge’s managers are on trial on prices of violating constructing codes.
South Korea has been stricken by a collection of human-caused disasters, together with a division retailer collapse, a ferry sinking and catastrophic fires. The nation has legal guidelines and tips on catastrophe prevention however not sufficient official dedication, specialists mentioned. Profession bureaucrats, they added, are extra preoccupied with catering to the “temper” — or political wants — of their bosses than with guaranteeing public security.
“Halloween in Itaewon had drawn massive crowds within the earlier years, too,” mentioned Yoon Yong-Kyun, an professional in catastrophe prevention at Semyung College. “If solely one of many prime bosses — the chiefs of Yongsan, the police and Seoul Metropolis or the president — had requested officers whether or not they had security plans in place, the catastrophe wouldn’t have occurred.”
