SEOUL: Controversial YouTuber and Twitch streamer Johnny Somali has been charged with “causing a commotion” at a convenience store in South Korea, prosecutors said Tuesday (Nov. 12).

They said the Somali American citizen, whose real name is Ramsey Khalid Ismael, cannot leave South Korea because of a travel ban linked to the case.

“He was charged on Monday without arrest for creating a scandal at a convenience store in October,” a spokesman for the Seoul Southern District Prosecutor’s Office told AFP.

A convenience store employee reported Somali to police on Oct. 17 when he confronted a worker after he was told not to drink alcohol inside the store.

He is also accused of making sexist comments towards the worker.

The Somali has dominated headlines in the country for a series of stunts, including kissing and twerking next to a statue commemorating Korean victims of wartime sexual slavery – euphemistically called “comfort women” – by the military. Japanese during World War II.

The incident, which appeared in a now-deleted video from his YouTube channel, sparked strong reactions and condemnation.

He later apologized.

“I want to apologize to the Korean people. I was not aware of the meaning of the statue… It was just entertainment for my audience,” he said in a video posted online.

Somali also caused controversy in neighboring Japan for his behavior, including taunting subway commuters over Nagasaki and Hiroshima, the two cities devastated by American nuclear bombs in 1945. – AFP