Photos of prisoner-of-war detention training falsely linked to S. Korean president's impeachment

"The South Korea-US joint military drill began this week... The US Forces Korea revealed the fact that they have conducted 'South Korea-US joint riot suppression training'!" read part of a Korean-language X post shared on March 14, 2025.

Two photos attached to the post show four soldiers getting off the back of a truck while they have their hands behind their heads, and the same soldiers lying face down on the ground.

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Screenshot of the false X post, captured on March 18, 2025

The posts appeared as the United States and South Korea kicked off the annual Freedom Shield drills on March 10, which the allies describe as defensive in nature (archived link).

According to the US military, the ground component of US Forces Korea and Combined Forces Command -- the US Eighth Army -- conducted "extensive combined training across South Korea’s ranges and operations centers, enhancing interoperability and combat readiness" (archived link).

The 11-day drills came as South Korea's Constitutional Court continued its longest deliberation in history on whether to uphold Yoon's impeachment over his disastrous December 3 declaration of martial law (archived link). 

Massive rival protests over the South Korean leader's political fate are ongoing, and police are prepared to mobilise "all available equipment" to prevent unrest when the court announces its verdict -- Yoon's supporters have already stormed a Seoul court once when a judge extended his detention (archived link).

Similar posts sharing the drill photos as a riot control exercise appeared elsewhere on Facebook, X, Threads, Naver Blog, Naver Cafe, DC Inside, Ilbe and MLB Park.

"This came up briefly during Trump's speech. He mentioned the US military's involvement in operations in the event of an emergency in its allies," read a comment on one of the posts.

Another said: "That means there is a possibility of riots due to spy activities."

But the US Eighth Army told AFP the photos show soldiers being trained on how to handle detainees in wartime.

'Wartime scenario training'

A reverse image search on Google found the photos had been released by the US Eighth Army on its official Facebook page on March 14 (archived link).

Their caption included a hashtag for "FreedomShield25" and states the soldiers "performed tasks on how to handle and process potential detainees during a wartime scenario".

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Screenshot comparison of the photos shared in false posts (left) and in their original context (right)

The US Army also wrote about the drills on its website, which makes no mention of exercises related to riots or riot control (archived link). 

South Korea's Defense Media Agency also published a similar photo of the wartime detainee drills on March 16 (archived link).

An Eighth Army official told AFP on March 18 the training was for "nothing else" other than prisoner-of-war detention operations and confirmed it was part of the annual Freedom Shield drills.

AFP separately found pictures from past joint detainee operations drills that captured similar scenes, including those from 2024 and 2016 (archived here and here). 

AFP has debunked other misinformation surrounding Yoon's impeachment process here.