South Korean court removes Yoon from office in unanimous impeachment verdict
In a session broadcast live on television, acting President of the Constitutional Court Moon Hyung-bae announced the decision, saying that Yoon did not meet the legal requirements of a national emergency needed to declare martial law.
The court found that Yoon's actions were serious enough to warrant his removal from office, Moon said, as he committed a "grave infringement of citizens' rights."
The decision closed a chapter on a months-long saga that has roiled the country and shaken Seoul's international standing, although concerns remain about whether it will further divide a deeply polarized country.
A new presidential election must now be held within 60 days, with acting President Han Duck-soo remaining in power in the meantime. Yoon, who did not attend court for the reading of the verdict, becomes the second South Korean president to leave office through impeachment, after President Park Geun-hye in 2017.
The leadership vacuum comes amid daunting international challenges for the country, analysts noted.
"Today's ruling means South Korea remains without an elected president for another two months just as U.S. President [Donald] Trump hits the country with 25% tariffs and teases resuming direct diplomacy with North Korea's Kim Jong Un," Sean King, senior vice president and East Asia expert at New York-based consulting firm Park Strategies, told UPI. "South Korea's effectively leaderless at a critical time."
Yoon, a 64-year-old former prosecutor, was impeached on Dec. 14 by the National Assembly over his shocking and short-lived declaration of martial law earlier in the month.
The Constitutional Court had the final say on whether to formally remove Yoon from office and a lengthy trial was concluded on Feb. 25. A decision was widely expected by mid-March, based on the timelines of two previous impeachment proceedings.
Instead, the drawn-out deliberation process sparked massive rallies on both sides of the issue, with hundreds of thousands of anxious protesters descending on central Seoul each weekend.
Police were at their highest alert level in the hours leading up to the decision Friday, completely closing off a 500-foot radius around the courthouse in what acting police chief Lee Ho-young described as a "vacuum state."
Buses and large portable fences were erected as barriers on streets surrounding the downtown courthouse and some 14,000 officers were deployed in Seoul. Schools and kindergartens within a radius of roughly half a mile of the court were closed on Friday, along with nearby national museums and popular tourist attractions.
A no-fly zone was imposed over the court, with police employing signal jammers for unauthorized drones. The South Korean military also said that it would bolster its surveillance operations against North Korea on the day of the impeachment decision.
The United States Assembly in Seoul canceled routine consular services on Friday and warned citizens to avoid large crowds and demonstrations related to the verdict.
Ahead of the decision, thousands of protesters on both sides of the issue continued to rally, with one faction calling for Yoon's impeachment holding an overnight vigil outside a subway station near the court.
Yoon claimed that he declared martial law on Dec. 3 to protect the public from "pro-North Korea anti-state forces" in the Democratic Party that were obstructing his agenda and paralyzing the government. Lawmakers were able to overturn the martial law decree hours later in a dramatic early-morning vote held as special forces troops dispatched by Yoon stormed the Assembly.
The impeached president has also continued to repeat unsubstantiated claims of election fraud alongside intimations of other nefarious North Korean and Chinese plots.
Yoon's supporters have echoed and amplified the conspiracies on platforms such as YouTube, with their demonstrations at times turning violent. In January, dozens of angry protesters stormed Seoul's Western District Court after Yoon was formally arrested for his martial law attempt, breaking windows, destroying property and injuring 17 police officers.
Public opinion has remained solidly in favor of Yoon's removal from office. In a survey released on Friday ahead of the verdict by pollster Gallup Korea, 57% percent of respondents said Yoon's impeachment should be upheld, while 37% said it should be dismissed.
Yoon is still facing a separate criminal trial on insurrection charges, which is slated to begin on April 14. He was being held in a detention center near Seoul, but was released in March.
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