South Korea\u2019s highest court has removed embattled President Yoon Suk Yeol from office, ending months of uncertainty and legal wrangling after he briefly declared martial law in December and plunged the nation into political turmoil. <\/p>\n
The court\u2019s decision on Friday marks Yoon\u2019s formal dismissal from the presidency after parliament voted to impeach him in December. His removal takes effect immediately, and he must now leave the presidential residence. <\/strong> <\/p>\n The long-running crisis has left a major global economy and key US ally rudderless at a fraught moment in world affairs, especially as US President Donald Trump\u2019s \u201cAmerica First\u201d agenda upends decades of foreign policy norms and dismantles the global trading system. <\/p>\n The Constitutional Court\u2019s eight justices unanimously ruled to uphold Yoon\u2019s impeachment. <\/p>\n Moon Hyung-bae, the court\u2019s acting head judge, said Yoon\u2019s martial law decree was unconstitutional as there was no grave national crisis at the time and his reasons for declaring it \u201ccannot be justified.\u201d <\/p>\n The president had violated the formal process of declaring martial law, infringed on lawmakers\u2019 rights, and violated his duty as head of the armed forces by forcing soldiers to confront the public, the judge added. <\/p>\n In a separate criminal trial, Yoon was arrested in January on charges of leading an insurrection, then released in March after a court canceled his arrest warrant \u2013 though it did not drop his charges. <\/p>\n The verdict was met with mixed reactions across the South Korean capital. <\/p>\n Yoon\u2019s opponents exploded in celebration and jubilation outside the court, waving flags and dancing to music. Many had been afraid that if he were reinstated, he could declare martial law again. But the mood was more still and somber outside Yoon\u2019s official residence where his conservative supporters had gathered. <\/p>\n The issue has been hugely divisive, with major crowds taking to the streets both for and against Yoon\u2019s removal. Police ramped up security in the capital ahead of the verdict, setting up barriers and checkpoints, and warning against any violence. <\/p>\n It\u2019s a remarkable fall from grace for the former prosecutor-turned-politician, who rose to prominence for his role in the impeachment and imprisonment of another president years ago \u2013 only to now meet the same fate. <\/p>\n Under South Korean law, a general election to choose a new president must be held within 60 days of Yoon\u2019s removal. <\/p>\n One potential candidate for the country\u2019s next president is opposition leader Lee Jae-myung, a former lawyer and lawmaker who narrowly lost to Yoon in the 2022 presidential election. <\/p>\n Meanwhile, Yoon is still dogged by other legal proceedings, including his insurrection trial. It\u2019s one of the few criminal charges a president does not have immunity from \u2013 and is punishable by life imprisonment or death, although South Korea has not executed anyone in decades. <\/p>\n The indictment had alleged that Yoon\u2019s imposition of martial law \u2013 during which he sent troops to parliament, with commanders testifying they were ordered to \u201cdrag out\u201d lawmakers \u2013 was an illegal attempt to shut down the National Assembly and arrest politicians and election authorities. <\/p>\n Yoon has said his decree was justified by political deadlock and threats from \u201canti-state forces\u201d sympathetic to North Korea, and was intended as a temporary warning to the liberal opposition. He claimed that he always planned to respect lawmakers\u2019 will if they voted to lift the decree. <\/p>\n In the end, his decree only lasted six hours. Yoon reversed the declaration after lawmakers forced their way into parliament and voted unanimously to block it \u2013 beginning four months of political disarray, during which parliament also voted to impeach the prime minister and acting president. <\/p>\n Before taking office in 2022, Yoon was a star prosecutor and a key figure in the sweeping investigation of South Korea\u2019s last impeached president, Park Geun-hye. Park was removed from office in 2017 and sentenced to prison for corruption and abuse of power in 2018. <\/p>\n Yoon is now the second president to be ousted by the Constitutional Court \u2013 and the shortest-serving elected leader in the nation\u2019s democratic history. <\/p>\n The swift series of events marks a dramatic decline for Yoon, who was once touted as a key ally by former US President Joe Biden. During a White House state dinner in 2023, Yoon stood as the honored guest and sung Don McLean\u2019s \u201cAmerican Pie\u201d to a delighted audience. <\/p>\n Yoon\u2019s serenade was meant to showcase his easy rapport with Washington, reinforcing Seoul\u2019s strategic ties with the US. His critics, however, saw the moment as an odd distraction from pressing domestic concerns. <\/p>\n Back home, he clashed fiercely with the opposition, who overwhelmingly won midterm elections and used parliament to impeach key cabinet members and hold up legislation. It was this gridlock that Yoon used to try to justify his fateful decree. <\/p>\n This is a developing story and will be updated.<\/em> <\/p>\n<\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" South Korea\u2019s highest court has removed embattled President Yoon Suk Yeol from office, ending months of…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":20189,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[24],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-20188","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-world-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stocksflux.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20188","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stocksflux.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stocksflux.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stocksflux.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stocksflux.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20188"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/stocksflux.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20188\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stocksflux.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/20189"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stocksflux.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20188"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stocksflux.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20188"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stocksflux.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20188"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}} What happens now?<\/h2>\n
Fall from grace<\/h2>\n