The head of state declared martial law on December 3, causing a political earthquake amid disagreement over the country's 2025 budget.
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South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol impeached after MP vote gathered in Seoul on Saturday December 14. At issue: his controversial choice to impose martial law on December 3, under the pretext “to protect liberal South Korea from threats posed by North Korean communist forces and eliminate elements hostile to the state. After a first vote boycotted by his party on December 7, the South Korean Assembly finally voted for the impeachment motion with 204 votes in favor and 85 against. Three deputies abstained and eight ballots were declared invalid, according to the result announced by the president of the chamber.
After his surprise decision of December 3, the unpopular conservative president was strongly criticized and accused from all sides, including in his own camp, of having shook the young South Korean democracy before reversing course six hours later, under pressure from deputies and demonstrators. Yoon Suk-yeol then presented his “sincere apologies”without presenting his resignation, in a short televised address to the nation. “I will not shy away from my legal and political responsibilities regarding the declaration of martial law”he promised then.
Shortly before the decree of martial law, opposition deputies, the majority in the National Assembly, had approved a considerably reduced budgetary program. Yoon Suk-yeol then accused the Democratic Party of cutting “all budgets essential to the primary functions of the nation, (…) transforming the country into a drug paradise and a place of chaos for public security”. According to him, the South Korean National Assembly was “become a refuge for criminals, a den of legislative dictatorship which seeks to paralyze the administrative and judicial systems and overthrow our liberal democratic order”.
On Saturday, a few minutes after the vote, the opposition welcomed the Assembly's vote. “Today’s impeachment is the great victory of the people and of democracy”welcomed Park Chan-dae, head of the Democratic Party group (main opposition force) in Parliament.
