Former President Joe Biden (right), with the First Lady, poses with former South Korean President Yook Suk Yeol (left). Credit line: Manuel Balce Ceneta / AP / Profimedia
A South Korean court is to deliver the verdict in President Yook Suk Yeol's insurrection trial, according to the BBC. Prosecutors sought the death penalty, alleging Yoon masterminded the December 2024 move to impose military rule.
Lawmakers scaled the walls of parliament to reject the order, while thousands of angry citizens took to the streets in protest.
It all only lasted six hours, but it was six hours that shook the fledgling democracy, and the fallout divided the country, crippled what was left of the government, and cost Yoon's party the next election.
Yoon is already serving time in prison for another conviction related to the martial law order. He still faces two more lawsuits.
Prosecutors asked for the death penalty. They argued that a lesser sentence might not send a strong enough message to those who might want to try something similar — the imposition of military rule.
Yoon will be in the same courtroom where another leader, Chun Doo-hwan, was sentenced to death some 30 years ago.
Chun, who seized power in a military coup in 1980 and ruled as dictator for much of the 1980s, was pardoned after serving just two years in prison.
Even if Yoon receives the death sentence, it will effectively be a life sentence because South Korea no longer carries out executions.
In January, Yoon was sentenced to five years in prison for resisting his own arrest and for forging documents.
In the first of several trials related to his martial law candidacy, he was convicted of failing to consult the entire cabinet before declaring martial law; as well as for drafting and then destroying a forged document which claimed that the martial law candidacy had been approved by the Prime Minister and the Minister of Defence.
It took around 3,000 police officers and more than two attempts to arrest him in January 2025.
A large group of security officers formed a human wall inside his residence to block the arrest, a move a special prosecutor investigating the allegation said was unprecedented.
Yoon, however, argued that the Corruption Investigation Bureau that was trying to arrest him had no jurisdiction to investigate the insurrection charges.
Yoon won the presidency in 2022. The country's former attorney general, he became nationally known for prosecuting the corruption case against former president Park Geun-hye
Yoon is accused of leading an insurrection in December 2024.
That Tuesday evening, he declared the country under military rule and banned all political activity.
He is accused of sending troops into parliament to arrest MPs who were gathering to vote against his order. He denies this, saying the troops were there to maintain order and martial law was a symbolic gesture to draw attention to the wrongdoings of the opposition.
