President Yun Seok-yeol on Wednesday became the first sitting South Korean leader to be detained for questioning on criminal charges, reaching an agreement with assembled law enforcement officials, ending a week of standoffs. .
Mr. Yoon's security guards successfully prevented investigators from detaining him on January 3, the first attempt to execute a court-issued detention warrant. Since then, the country has been gripped by fears of violent conflict if both sides refuse to withdraw.
But when investigators returned on Wednesday with far more officers, some of whom carried ladders to scale the barricade, Mr. Yoon's bodyguards offered conspicuous resistance. There wasn't.
Yun will now face questioning by officials investigating the Dec. 3 declaration of martial law. Investigators will be able to question him for the next 48 hours, after which they may apply for another court warrant to formally arrest him.
In a video message released shortly after his detention, Yun said he agreed to be interrogated to avoid a “bloody” confrontation between his bodyguards and police. But he argued the search and detention warrants were illegal.
The opposition-led National Assembly rushed to reject Yun's martial law last month, but has since accused him of committing rebellion by sending armed troops into parliament to seize parliament and detain political opponents. are.
At the same time as the criminal investigation, the Constitutional Court is deliberating whether the Dec. 14 parliamentary vote to impeach Yun was legitimate and whether he should be formally removed from office.
Police buses began converging early on Wednesday outside the hilltop presidential palace where Yun has barricaded himself since his impeachment. He was the first South Korean leader to bring the country under military rule since democracy began in the late 1980s.
Investigators and police gathered at the front gate of Yoon's residence and climbed over a bus barricade blocking the road with ladders. The group arrived at the entrance of Mr. Yoon's residence and met with the president's security guards and lawyers.
At around 8:30 a.m., Yun's press secretary, attorney Seok Dong-hyun, posted on Facebook that the president had not yet been arrested and that his legal team was negotiating with investigators regarding the possibility of Yun's voluntary arrest. He posted that he was doing so. Present yourself for questioning.
Investigators are bracing for a repeat of the standoff that occurred when they first visited Yoon's residence on January 3 to submit a detention warrant. They were then outnumbered by presidential security personnel and had to survive an embarrassing retreat after a stalemate that lasted five and a half hours.
On Wednesday morning, Yun and his supporters prepared to resist another call for his arrest as his lawyers, members of his party and officials from the Presidential Security Office stood outside the gates of the compound. It looked like it was. Live footage from the street leading up to his compound in the morning showed a tense confrontation in sub-zero temperatures, at one point involving people being shoved and a physical scuffle.
Since the first attempt to detain Mr. Yoon, his guards have fortified the compound by deploying more buses and razor wire to block off gates and walls. Yun vowed to “fight until the end” to return to power and said he would not comply with court warrants that he believed were illegal.
South Korea's acting president and vice prime minister, Choi Sang-mok, warned government agencies involved in the confrontation against the violence.
“All our people and the international community are watching this,” he said in a statement. “Physical violence for any purpose cannot be tolerated, as it irreparably damages public trust and international reputation.”
The attempt to take Mr. Yoon away and force him to answer to charges of sedition marks the first time in South Korean history that authorities have attempted to detain a sitting president. The ongoing events shook the country, with news and social media channels providing live streaming coverage. If neither side backs down, violent conflict could ensue.
The previous day, the Constitutional Court began hearing whether to dismiss Yoon, who did not appear for the hearing. His lawyers said they feared investigators would detain him if he left the presidential palace.
In a final attempt to execute the warrant, a number of members of the Presidential Security Service, the government agency tasked with protecting the president and his family, and the Office of High-Level Corruption Investigations, which sought to detain the president with the cooperation of the government, CIO). police. They sent 200 bodyguards and soldiers to stop 100 CIO officials and police officers.
Jin Yuyoung Contributed to the report.
