The Presidential Security Service involved
The CIO asked the police to take charge of this arrest “given their expertise in executing arrest warrants,” he added. Police did not immediately respond to this request. On Friday, CIO investigators supported by police officers entered the president’s residence to apprehend him. But they came up against an army unit and agents of the Presidential Security Service (PSS) twice as numerous as them, and had retreated, empty-handed, after six hours of face-to-face confrontation. tense.
Lee Jae-seung also indicated that the IOC sent a letter to Acting President Choi Sang-mok on Saturday “to demand cooperation from the Presidential Security Service regarding the mandate.” “But we have not received a response,” he lamented.
Former star prosecutor elected in 2022, Yoon Suk-yeol, was dismissed by the National Assembly on December 14. He is the target of an investigation for “rebellion”, a crime punishable by death, for having introduced martial law by surprise on December 3 and sending the army to Parliament to muzzle him, before reversing course shortly after under pressure from deputies and thousands of pro-democracy demonstrators.
The protests continue
Like every day since December 31, hundreds of unconditional supporters of Yoon Suk-yeol were present Monday morning, in the mist, near the home of the deposed president, ready to fight in the event of a new arrest attempt by the IOC and monitored by numerous police officers, saw AFP journalists on site. “The Presidential Security Service will protect the president, and we will protect the Presidential Security Service until midnight. If they get a new arrest warrant, we will come back,” said one of the organizers of the rally, Kim Soo-yong, 62.
Around thirty deputies from the People’s Power Party (PPP), Mr. Yoon’s right-wing party, arrived at dawn at the presidential residence, near which around fifty detractors of the deposed president were also demonstrating.
“The IOC is one of the most incompetent agencies I have ever seen. I have been here longer than the IOC. It doesn’t make sense that they can’t do it. They must stop it immediately,” said one of these demonstrators, Kim Ah-young, in her thirties.
Antony Blinken visits amid the imbroglio
This psychodrama takes place at a time when American Secretary of State Antony Blinken is in Seoul, the first stop on a farewell tour which will also take him to Japan and France. His schedule does not include any meeting with Yoon Suk-yeol.
Yoon Suk-yeol’s lawyers argue that the arrest warrant is “invalid and illegal.” Their appeal against the mandate was rejected by a Seoul court, but they indicated their intention to appeal. The head of the Presidential Security Service, Park Jong-jun, invoked this argument on Sunday to justify his refusal to allow Yoon Suk-yeol to be arrested “The execution of an arrest warrant whose procedural and legal regularity is subject of protests compromises the fundamental mission of the PSS, which is to ensure the absolute security of the president. Responding to such a situation would amount to abandoning our duty,” he wrote in a statement on Sunday, while Yoon Suk-yeol’s detractors accuse his service of having become a “private militia” of the president.
On Sunday, one of the lawyers of the deposed president, Yoon Kab-keun, also announced the filing of a complaint against the head of the IOC. South Korea’s Constitutional Court, which has until mid-June to confirm or overturn the impeachment of Yoon Suk-yeol voted by Parliament on December 14, announced that hearings would begin on January 14. In the meantime, the suspended Yoon Suk-yeol officially remains the country’s president.
