South Korea’s Constitutional Court began formal deliberations on Tuesday to decide whether to impeach President Yoon Suk Yeol. The ousted leader did not escape, locked in his presidential compound as he prepared for what his aides called a “siege attack” from about 1,000 criminal investigators who planned to arrest him on charges of treason.
Mr. Yoon has been suspended since being impeached by the National Assembly on December 14 for his temporary imposition of martial law 11 days earlier. But he refused to step down. Instead, he vowed to “fight to the end” to regain power through a trial at the Constitutional Court, and denied the demands he made to officials conducting a separate investigation into the treason case.
Continued efforts to bring Mr. Yoon’s self-imposed declaration of military rule and his refusal to cooperate with all investigations have so far left South Korea in a political limbo, sowing doubts about the tenacity of its decades-old democracy.
The Constitutional Court is the only one that has the power to decide whether the proceedings in the parliament were lawful and whether Mr. Yoon should be formally removed or reinstated. Small but noisy groups of citizens clashed on a narrow street in front of the court on Tuesday as the first trial opened. The wall of the court was full of flowers sent by Mr. Yoon.
But Mr. Yoon didn’t show up: His lawyers said he feared that rebel investigators would arrest him if he left his presidential palace. The court knelt after four minutes on Tuesday when it found Mr. Yoon is absent. It said it will continue to discuss on Thursday, when it will be able to proceed with or without it.
The court hearing plays a secondary role in the drama about the criminal investigation. When the investigators first visited Mr. Yoon on Jan. 3 to serve an arrest warrant, his guards blocked their way with cars, buses and by building human chains. The investigators withdrew, vowing to return with other officers.
Tensions in the area – and fears that there could be clashes between the president’s bodyguards and the police – have escalated in recent weeks. The service of Mr. Yoon’s Presidential Security Service turned the hilly area of central Seoul into a fortress, sending more buses and rolls of razor wire to block its gates and walls. Sedition investigators and the police have been working on a detailed plan on how to break through the barriers and arrest Mr.
On Tuesday, the presidential officer of Mr. Yoon, Chung Jin-suk, matched Mr. Yoon and the besieged leader “stayed alone in the castle, with no one to help him as the sun was setting.”
“They have completed their preparations for the attack,” said Mr. Chung, a former journalist and law enforcement officer, referred to the police and investigators.
In the first unsuccessful attempt to arrest Mr. Yoon, about 100 prosecutors, investigators and police visited his residence but were outnumbered by presidential guards and soldiers. In their second attempt, police officials said they are planning to deploy 1,000 police officers, including those working to bust drugs and other gangs.
Investigators and police met with officials from Mr. Yoon’s Presidential Security Service on Tuesday to discuss how to solve the problem. But there was no immediate sign of a resolution.
The assistants of Mr. Yoon tried to prevent him from facing the shame of being the first president to be arrested by his law enforcement agencies, which would take him to their headquarters in the south of the city.
His lawyers contested the legality of the court’s decision to detain him. Instead they suggested that the investigators ask Mr. Yoon where he lives or in a neutral place while they allow him to be tried in the Constitutional Court and answer the different charges of treason as a free person.
But the majority of South Koreans want Mr. Yoon was arrested and removed from office, according to the investigation.
The last part of Mr. Yoon’s security – the Presidential Security Unit – has begun to show cracks: Its chief, Park Jong-joon, stepped down last week before turning himself in to the police to be investigated over whether he committed a crime of obstructing the operation of the law enforcement agency during his tenure. prevented investigators from issuing a warrant.
On Monday, the organization said it had suspended one of its officials after the official had a secret meeting with the police. The official is accused of cooperating with the police by sharing information about the president’s residence, including its building. But the organization says that it has not punished anyone for “speaking what is on his mind” in the internal meeting, which shows that there was a conflict between the presidential guards about whether it is right for them to stop the government officials who work for them to issue a warrant.
The Presidential Security Service is supported by the police and the military.
Both the police and the army say they do not want their soldiers and the police to be dragged to help stop Mr.
On Monday, Lee Jae-myung, the main opposition leader, urged Deputy Prime Minister Choi Sang-mok, the country’s unelected acting president, to stop the president’s bodyguards from preventing officials from serving the warrant. But Mr. Choi refused to take sides, urging both investigators and presidential guards to resolve their dispute peacefully, not through “violent means.”
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