South Korean police have raided the headquarters of Starbucks Korea as part of an investigation into a marketing campaign that critics say trivialised the country's 1980 Gwangju pro-democracy uprising. Investigators searched the Seoul offices on Tuesday and reportedly also searched the homes of company executives, following complaints from relatives of victims of the crackdown, in which around 200 people were officially recorded as killed.

The controversy centred on a range of reusable tumblers branded "SS Tank", with 18 May designated "Tank Day" – the anniversary of the Gwangju massacre – alongside a slogan widely seen as echoing a notorious 1987 police cover-up of a student activist's death under torture. The backlash led Shinsegae Group, which owns a 67.5% stake in Starbucks Korea, to scrap the promotion, sack the chief executive, and issue a televised apology from its chair, Chung Yong-jin. Starbucks Korea also closed all its stores nationwide on 22 June for mandatory training on history and social awareness.