Merchandise 1 of 4 A bunch of far-right protesters collect to help former South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol, earlier than a bus carrying him arrives for a primary court docket ruling in a case together with obstruction of arrest, linked to his martial regulation declaration, at a court docket in Seoul, South Korea, January 16, 2026. REUTERS/Kim Soo-hyeon
SEOUL, Jan 16 (Reuters) – A South Korean court docket on Friday sentenced former President Yoon Suk Yeol to 5 years in jail on costs that included obstructing makes an attempt by authorities to arrest him following his failed bid to impose martial regulation in December 2024.
The Seoul Central District Courtroom discovered Yoon responsible of mobilising the presidential safety service to dam authorities from executing an arrest warrant to research him for his martial regulation declaration.
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In televised proceedings, the 65-year-old former prosecutor was additionally discovered responsible of costs that included fabricating official paperwork and failing to observe the authorized course of required for martial regulation, which must be mentioned at a proper cupboard assembly.
The ruling is the primary associated to the legal costs Yoon faces over his botched martial regulation declaration.
“The defendant abused his monumental affect as president to stop the execution of official warrants by officers from the Safety Service, which successfully privatised officers … loyal to the Republic of Korea for private security and private achieve,” the lead decide on the three-justice panel mentioned.
YOON SHOWED NO REACTION
Yoon, his hair streaked with gray, listened intently because the decide delivered the ruling, wanting noticeably slimmer than when he first got here beneath investigation a 12 months in the past.
He confirmed no response because the sentence was introduced in a courtroom full of a lot of his supporters.
Talking outdoors the court docket instantly afterwards, certainly one of Yoon’s attorneys, Yoo Jung-hwa, mentioned the previous president would attraction. “We categorical remorse that the choice was made in a politicised method,” she mentioned.
Prosecutors didn’t reply questions from reporters about whether or not they would lodge an attraction, which they’re entitled to do beneath South Korean regulation.
Prosecutors have requested the court docket in a separate trial to condemn Yoon to dying for masterminding an rebel by making an attempt to impose army rule with out justification and to droop parliament.
Yoon, who’s at present being held within the Seoul Detention Heart on the outskirts of the capital, has argued it was inside his powers as president to declare martial regulation and that the motion was aimed toward sounding the alarm over the obstruction of presidency by opposition events.
TIGHT SECURITY
A number of dozen supporters gathered outdoors the court docket complicated forward of the listening to, holding indicators that mentioned Yoon was the sufferer of a political witch hunt. “Historical past would be the decide,” the placards mentioned, and that Yoon remained the president.
There was a heavy police presence in and across the court docket that’s just a few blocks from Yoon’s upscale residence in Seoul.
Yoon might have confronted as much as 10 years in jail over the obstruction costs associated to when he barricaded himself inside his residential compound in January final 12 months and ordered the safety service to dam investigators.
He was lastly arrested in a second try involving greater than 3,000 law enforcement officials. Yoon’s arrest was the primary ever for a sitting president in South Korea.
Parliament, joined by some members of Yoon’s conservative celebration, voted inside hours to overturn his shock martial regulation decree and later impeached him, suspending his powers.
He was faraway from workplace in April final 12 months by the Constitutional Courtroom, which dominated he violated the duties of his workplace.
Whereas Yoon’s bid to impose martial regulation lasted solely about six hours, it despatched shockwaves by South Korea, which is Asia’s fourth-largest economic system, a key U.S. safety ally and lengthy thought of one of many world’s most resilient democracies.
Yoon is the newest in a sequence of South Korean presidents who’ve been convicted and imprisoned, together with former basic Chun Doo-hwan who was sentenced to dying in 1996 for a brutal crackdown on mass protests in Gwangju in 1980. Chun’s sentence was later commuted and he was pardoned after serving two years in jail.
Reporting by Heejin Kim, Joyce Lee, Kyu-seok Shim, writing by Jack Kim; Enhancing by Ed Davies and Kate Mayberry
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