South Korean opposition leader stabbed in neck

South Korean opposition party leader Lee Jae-myung was attacked on Tuesday while talking to reporters in the port city of Busan.

South Korean opposition party leader Lee Jae-myung falls after being attacked by an unidentified man during his visit to Busan, South Korea, on Tuesday. Picture: Reuters 

South Korean opposition leader Lee Jae-myung has been stabbed in the neck in front of a media pack as he visited the southeastern port city of Busan.

The shocking assault came as Mr Lee, 59, was talking to reporters at a crowded press conference on Tuesday morning after touring the construction site of a new airport.

Footage of the attack showed a man lunging at the Democratic Party leader from a crowd of reporters before being quickly dragged away by onlookers.

Korean newsagency Yonhap reported that the man had ­approached Mr Lee asking for his autograph. The attacker was posing as a supporter, wearing a paper crown with Mr Lee’s name written on it.

The opposition leader was left bleeding from the neck and was taken to Pusan National University Hospital for emergency treatment.

He was later transferred by helicopter to Seoul National University Hospital for surgery.

Party spokesman Kwon Chil-seung said Pusan National University Hospital medical staff suspected damage to a jugular vein that carries blood from the head to the heart.

“There is concern that there could be a large haemorrhage or additional haemorrhage,” Mr Kwon said.

President Yoon Suk Yeol ­expressed “deep concern” about Mr Lee’s safety and ordered the police and relevant authorities “to swiftly determine the facts” about the attack.

“The President emphasised that this form of violence should not be tolerated under any circumstances in our society,” a spokesman for Mr Yoon said.

Police in Busan said the ­attacker, who appeared to be in his 50s or 60s, had been detained. They did not comment on his suspected motives.

Mr Lee, leader of the centre-left Democratic Party, narrowly lost South Korea’s presidential election in 2022, which was marked by rhetoric that was ugly even by the standards of the combative democracy.

In 2023 he was embroiled in a corruption scandal when he was accused of asking a businessman to illegally transfer $US8m to North Korea at the height of the then Moon administration’s rapprochement in 2019-20.

The alleged aim for the funds was to facilitate a visit for the now opposition leader to the North to discuss a joint venture.

Mr Lee has denied all the charges claiming “political prosecution”.

South Korean politicians cannot be arrested without parliamentary approval and Mr Lee’s Democratic Party has the majority. His own party in September agreed that the charges could be brought against him.

The country is due for parliamentary elections in April.

On Tuesday, a spokesman for the Democratic Party said: “Terrorism against Lee Jae-myung is a serious threat to democracy”.

South Korea transitioned to democracy in the late 1980s after decades of authoritarian rule.

The country has strict restrictions on gun possession, but the country has a history of political violence involving other weapons.

Mr Lee’s predecessor, Song Young-gil, was attacked in 2022 at a public event by an assailant who struck him on the head with a hammer.

Then-conservative opposition party leader Park Geun-hye, who later served as president, was ­attacked at an event in 2006 with a knife and suffered a gash on her face that required surgery.

In 2015, a 55-year-old South Korean man slashed the face of Mark Lippert, then the US ambassador to South Korea, with a kitchen knife. The attacker said he was protesting the annual joint military exercises between the US and South Korean military.