Live Updates: South Korea’s President Faces Impeachment Motion
"It was submitted hours after President Yoon Suk Yeol rescinded a martial law declaration. His extraordinary overnight move incited protests and political turmoil.
Pinned
Members of South Korea’s opposition submitted a motion on Wednesday to impeach President Yoon Suk Yeol after his imposition of martial law plunged the country into a political crisis.
His declaration of martial law — in an unscheduled televised address late Tuesday — incited political chaos within one of America’s closest allies and evoked memories of the dictatorial postwar regimes that stifled peaceful dissent and created a police state. Mr. Yoon’s ploy appeared to backfire over the course of one tense night, and before the sun rose in Seoul on Wednesday, he had backed down.
The National Assembly can impeach a president and suspend him if 200 of its 300 members vote in favor. To remove the president from office, South Korea's Constitutional Court must approve the impeachment in a trial.
South Korea’s opposition, which controls the National Assembly, has threatened to impeachPresident Yoon Suk Yeol if he does not resign after his ill-fated decision to impose martial law.
If Mr. Yoon quits or is removed from office then, under the constitution, Prime Minister Han Duck-soo will step in to perform presidential duties.
Military helicopters
landed in this field
Lawmakers met in the
National Assembly main hall
Some troops entered the
building from the back
Staffers barred troops
from front entrance
Police barricaded
the main gates
Perimeter
fence
Thousands of protesters
gathered in front of gates
The impeachment bill was jointly proposed by six parties but not the president’s own ruling party, according to KBS, the national broadcaster.
Opposition lawmakers in South Korea submitted a motion on Wednesday to impeach President Yoon Suk Yeol, setting off a proceeding to remove him from office.
Kim Yongmin, a lawmaker of the opposition Democratic Party, announced the motion in a news conference on Wednesday, adding that it would be placed on the agenda of the National Assembly’s plenary session at 12:01 a.m. on Thursday and voted on as early as Friday.
The last time South Korea was under martial law, Chung Chin-ook was in his first year of high school, more than 40 years ago. His home city of Gwangju rose up to protest oppressive measures by the military junta, only to face a brutal, bloody crackdown.
Late Tuesday night, those memories raced through the now 60-year-old lawmaker’s head as he scaled the fence surrounding the National Assembly. He and other members rushed to the chamber to nullify President Yoon Suk Yeol’s imposition of martial law, evading the police officials who stood guard at the gates.
Members of South Korea’s opposition parties protested at the steps of the National Assembly in Seoul on Wednesday, demanding that President Yoon Suk Yeol step down and be arrested.
The United States and South Korea postponed a high-level meeting Wednesday between military officials to discuss nuclear deterrence issues, according to a U.S. defense official who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss a sensitive matter.
The secretary general of South Korea’s National Assembly, Kim Min-ki, condemned the military on Wednesday morning for breaking into the legislature during President Yoon Suk Yeol’s brief imposition of martial law, saying that nearly 300 troops had stormed the compound.
“I strongly condemn the illegal, unconstitutional actions of the military and the destruction it caused at the National Assembly premises due to President Yoon’s decree of martial law,” Mr. Kim said at a news briefing. He vowed to seek legal remedies for the damage caused, and he said the police, who prevented some lawmakers from entering the building overnight, would be barred from the premises.
South Korea’s Democratic party said in a statement Wednesday that if President Yoon does not resign they would immediately begin impeachment proceedings. The opposition lawmakers, who control the National Assembly, said Yoon's use of martial law was unconstitutional, and was “a grave act of insurrection, and clear grounds for impeachment.”
As South Korea's allies monitored the political turmoil there on Wednesday, a spokesman for Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson of Sweden said he had postponed a planned summit with President Yoon later this week.
Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba of Japan said he had not yet decided whether to postpone a planned visit to South Korea in January to meet with President Yoon. "We have been watching the situation with particular and grave interest," he said. Mr. Ishiba has supported closer security ties with South Korea to offset the challenges of China and North Korea.
South Korean stocks and the country’s currency were rattled on Wednesday, prompting officials to pledge “unlimited” support to markets after a tense night during which President Yoon Suk Yeol declared and then lifted martial law.
The benchmark Kospi index fell 1.4 percent, recovering somewhat from a deeper loss earlier in the day. Big banks were hit particularly hard, and an index tracking the financial sector dropped about 4 percent, a reflection of general economic unease. Shares of some of South Korea’s biggest companies were also down, with Samsung Electronics losing 1 percent and Hyundai Motor shedding more than 2 percent.
The secretary general of the National Assembly, Kim Min-ki, said that he would hold the military accountable for its role in imposing martial law briefly overnight, including their forced entry to the National Assembly.
He also said the police would be banned from the assembly building. He gave the first detailed account, as CCTV of the evening played, of what military resources were used overnight: About 230 personnel flew in helicopters to the assembly and then about 50 of them climbed over the fences. He promised to release the full video.
Several senior aides to President Yoon, including his chief of staff, collectively tendered their resignation following the martial law declaration, according to KBS, South Korea’s national broadcaster. The top aides included his national security adviser and chief of staff for policy, according to Yonhap news agency.
South Korea's financial leaders have moved swiftly to reassure investors. Deputy Prime Minister Choi Sang-mok, in a news conference on Wednesday morning, said the government would “closely communicate” with other major economies and will act to limit the impact on the nation’s economy
The minister, who is also the economy minister, walked out of the news conference without taking any questions. One reporter shouted, “will the entire cabinet resign?” There was no response.
For many younger South Koreans, President Yoon Suk Yeol’s short-lived declaration of martial law late Tuesday night was their first exposure to a kind of turbulence that older generations remember all too well.
Since South Korea was founded in 1948, a number of presidents have declared states of military emergency. The most recent — and the most notorious, perhaps — came after the 1979 assassination of President Park Chung-hee, a former general who had occasionally used martial law himself to crack down on political protests and opposition since seizing power in 1961.
Protesters have gathered at the edge of Gwanghwamun Square in central Seoul, as the rush hour commute unfolds around them. Some are holding signs calling for President Yoon’s resignation.
Police officers in bright-green vests, some of them holding riot shields, are milling around the square and the entrance to nearby Gyeongbokgung Palace.
There is a robust protest culture in South Korea, and the Gwanghwamun area of Seoul is often thronged with demonstrators on weekends. Many rallies are organized by powerful unions, including the one that declared an “indefinite general strike” on Wednesday. In 2017, massive protests by opponents of President Park Geun-hye triggered her impeachment.
The South Korean stock market began the local trading day on Wednesday roughly 1.5 percent lower than it ended on Tuesday, after the whiplash from the president’s decision to declare martial law then reverse it.
Yoon Suk Yeol won South Korea’s highest office in 2022 by a threadbare margin, the closest since his country abandoned military rule in the 1980s and began holding free presidential elections.
Just over two years later, Mr. Yoon’s brief declaration of martial law on Tuesday shocked South Koreans who had hoped that tumultuous era of military intervention was behind them. Thousands of protesters gathered in Seoul to call for his arrest. Their country, regarded as a model of cultural soft power and an Asian democratic stalwart, had suddenly taken a sharp turn in another direction.
Minutes after South Korea’s president, Yoon Suk Yeol, declared martial law on Tuesday night through a decree, Lee Jae-myung, the main opposition leader, called on his supporters and members of his party to gather at the National Assembly.
Mr. Lee wanted lawmakers to pass a binding resolution to nullify the martial law decree, and he warned that the president might order the military to arrest them to stop the vote."
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