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As protests in Korea over U.S. beef imports began to stretch into their third month, what had largely been peaceful demonstrations began to break down into violence. With Korea set to resume inspecting imports of U.S. beef after reaching a new understanding on imports with the United States, angry protesters attacked police with steel pipes and stones. Some attempted to use ropes to remove buses set up by the police to block the path of protestors. The violence left several hundred protestors and police injured.

The protests peaked June 10, the anniversary of democracy demonstrations, with estimates of nearly 200,000 protestors nationwide, but have since dwindled to numbers in the low thousands, and on some days only in the hundreds. After taking a lenient approach to the protests over the last two months, President Lee Myung-bak ordered a crackdown on illegal protests June 24. Local police, who had refrained from using water cannons to disperse the crowds after earlier criticism, have begun using them and are considering using tear gas to disperse the increasingly violent protestors.