South Korea Schedules Presidential Impeachment Vote for Saturday

A vote in the South Korean parliament on the proposed impeachment of President Yoon Suk Yeol is scheduled for Saturday at around 7:00 pm (1000 GMT).

“The vote on President Yoon’s impeachment motion will take place around 7:00 pm on Saturday,” opposition lawmaker Jo Seoung-lae told reporters.

Embattled President Yoon Suk Yeol will not make any public statements Thursday, his office said, after he plunged the country into political chaos with a short-lived declaration of martial law.

“President Yoon will not make any statements today,” a presidential official told reporters, as the opposition set an impeachment vote for Saturday.

The police have begun investigating President Yoon Suk Yeol for alleged “insurrection” over his declaration of martial law, a senior police officer said Thursday.

Woo Jong-soo, head of the National Investigation Headquarters at the National Police Agency, informed lawmakers that the case had been officially assigned.

President Yoon is facing calls for his resignation following lawmakers’ rejection of his brief attempt to impose martial law, which sparked mass protests across the nation.

Yoon’s unexpected move to declare martial law, the first in South Korea in over four decades, has plunged the country into one of its most significant crises in its modern democratic history, leaving close international allies stunned.

The United States, which maintains nearly 30,000 troops in South Korea, initially expressed serious concern over the declaration but later welcomed the end of martial law.

These dramatic events have cast uncertainty over the political future of Yoon, a conservative leader and former high-profile prosecutor who assumed the presidency in 2022.

South Korea’s main opposition party — whose lawmakers jumped fences and tussled with security forces so they could vote to overturn the law — demanded Yoon’s immediate resignation.

“We will file charges of insurrection,” against Yoon, his defence and interior ministers and “key military and police figures involved, such as the martial law commander and the police chief”, the Democratic Party said in a statement.

It added that it would also push for impeachment.

The nation’s largest umbrella labour union called an “indefinite general strike” until Yoon resigned.

And the leader of Yoon’s own ruling party described the attempt as “tragic” while calling for those involved to be held accountable.

Yoon stunned the world with a late-night television announcement that he was declaring martial law because of the threat of North Korea and “anti-state forces”.

More than 280 troops backed by 24 helicopters arrived at parliament to lock down the site after the extraordinary declaration.

But 190 lawmakers defied the rifle-carrying soldiers to force their way into parliament to vote against the move, leaving Yoon with no choice but to retract.

Under the constitution, martial law must be lifted when a majority in parliament demands it.

“Just a moment ago, there was a demand from the National Assembly to lift the state of emergency, and we have withdrawn the military that was deployed for martial law operations,” Yoon said in a televised address around 4:30 am (1930 GMT Tuesday).

“We will accept the National Assembly’s request and lift the martial law through the Cabinet meeting.”

Senior aides working for Yoon offered Wednesday to resign en masse over the martial law declaration.

The U-turn prompted jubilation among protesters outside parliament who had braved freezing temperatures to keep vigil through the night in defiance of Yoon’s martial law order.