<Anchor> During the
night, self-employed car demonstrations took place in Seoul and other parts of the country to change the quarantine guidelines. This is the first time nationwide protests have taken place, and the self-employed complained that they could not stand it any longer.
Reporter Yoo Deok-gi reports.
<Reporter>
Early this morning, on the Olympic Avenue heading to Yeouido, Seoul, a slow procession of vehicles continues with emergency lights turned on.
Self-employed people sometimes honk their car horns to a certain beat, meaning 'SOS signal'.
[Byung-Hoon Oh / PC room operation: I lost my hard-earned money (I used to do business) in an instant and I only got into debt… I came out once before I really died.] The
self-employed, who were tired of the high-intensity quarantine guidelines, went out on the road once again to protest the government.
However, the police saw this demonstration as an illegal assembly and deployed 21 units in Yeouido and surrounding roads and continued to check them.
There were no major clashes, but there were some quarrels between the police and some of the participants.
[Police: I cracked down on using a horn.]
[Self-employed person participating in the protest: Isn't it illegal to stop business? Isn't it illegal to stop business?] The
self-employed people demanded that the current quarantine measures be centered on unnecessary regulations and reorganize the policy based on individual standards rather than facility standards.
[Kim Ki-hong / Co-CEO of Self-Employed Non-Captain: Please stop this quarantine that sacrifices only the self-employed and remove the distance.]
Self-employed car demonstrations continued not only in Seoul but also in 9 regions across the country, including Daejeon, Ulsan, and Jeonbuk.
In relation to the Seoul vehicle demonstration, which involved more than 2,000 vehicles estimated by the assembly and 120 vehicles estimated by the police, the police are taking a strict stance against confirmed illegal activities.