Today in Korean history

May 20

1949 -- Kim Yak-su and Lee Mun-won, lawmakers in South Korea's first National Assembly, are arrested for arguing for the withdrawal of foreign troops from the country and negotiations on the reunification of the two Koreas. As a result of their assertions, the two were accused of being communist sympathizers.

1954 -- The country's third parliamentary election is held.

1962 -- The South Korean government revives a nationwide curfew. The curfew was originally imposed in 1945 and finally abolished in 1982.

1980 -- The Supreme Court confirms the death sentence for Kim Jae-gyu, former head of the Korean Central Intelligence Agency, who assassinated then-President Park Chung-hee in October 1979. He was executed in May 1980.

1986 -- Lee Dong-su, a student activist at Seoul National University, burns himself to death at the school's student center, calling for "the eradication of U.S. imperialism" and punishment of then-President Chun Doo-hwan, whom Lee called a fascist.

2003 -- Lee Keun-young, former head of the Financial Supervisory Commission, is arrested on charges of arranging illegal loans to Hyundai affiliates in 2000 in connection with a scandal involving payoffs to North Korea ahead of the first-ever inter-Korean summit.

2010 -- A probe led by an international team of investigators concludes that a North Korean torpedo sank the Cheonan warship on March 26 near the tense inter-Korean border in the Yellow Sea, killing 46 sailors.
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