SEOUL, Aug 22, 2024 (AFP) - South Korea held a nationwide drill on Thursday that sowed confusion in the capital as traffic was brought to a standstill and thousands of civilians practised emergency evacuations.

The exercise, linked to the ongoing joint military drills between the United States and South Korea known as Ulchi Freedom Shield, is designed to simulate a war or national emergency. Similar drills happen every year.

In downtown Seoul, an air raid siren blared, followed by loudspeaker announcements urging people to seek shelter. Thousands of pedestrians and government employees cleared from streets and offices, while traffic stopped in some areas, causing confusion and frustration.

"I got stuck in traffic. I didn't even realise there was a drill, and I didn't think it was important," said Kim So-hyeong who was driving through central Seoul.

"I feel like there was a lack of information about the drill. My GPS kept giving me different directions and made me go in circles, so I felt stuck," she added.

Park Jun-ho, who works at a startup in Seoul's upscale Gangnam district, said he heard the siren from his office but did not participate.
"Nobody in our office went out," said Park. "I don't even think people in our company would know where to go."

The broad indifference to annual civil defence training stems from the fact that the South has been technically at war with the North since the 1950s, said Park Hyo-sun, a professor at Cheongju University, so there is little sense of urgency to the situation.

"The training itself is to teach the public what to do when a war happens, which we technically are in," said Park. "But people forget that we are at war, and the level of alertness is very low."

This year's drill included responding to a North Korean drone attack and to terrorist incidents, but a planned exercise to deal with trash-laden balloons was cancelled.

Relations between the two Koreas are at one of their lowest points in years, with the North ramping up weapons testing and bombarding the South with balloons.

Kim Myung-oh, director-general of emergency planning and civil defence at Seoul City Hall, said the training was an important way for "civilians to learn about shelters close to them and know what to do".