BY MIRABEL ODETA
A South Korean court on Friday sentenced former President Yoon Suk Yeol to five years in prison after finding him guilty of obstructing authorities who attempted to arrest him following his failed effort to impose martial law in December 2024, a move that plunged the country into political turmoil.
The Seoul Central District Court ruled that Yoon illegally mobilised the presidential security service to block investigators from executing an arrest warrant as they sought to question him over his controversial martial law declaration. The court found that Yoon, a former top prosecutor, abused his presidential authority by directing security officials to shield him from lawful arrest, undermining the rule of law and the independence of state institutions.
During the televised sentencing, the 65-year-old was also convicted of fabricating official documents and bypassing mandatory legal procedures required for declaring martial law, which under South Korean law must be deliberated at a formal cabinet meeting. Judges said Yoon failed to follow these constitutional safeguards and acted unilaterally, despite the extraordinary nature of the powers he sought to invoke.
“This defendant abused the enormous influence of the presidency to prevent the execution of legitimate warrants through officials of the Security Service,” the presiding judge said while reading the verdict. The court added that Yoon effectively turned public officials loyal to the Republic of Korea into instruments for his own personal safety and political interests.
Yoon listened quietly as the sentence was handed down, showing no visible reaction in a courtroom filled with supporters. Observers noted he appeared thinner and visibly aged compared with his public appearances when investigations first began nearly a year ago. After the ruling, his legal team criticised the decision, with lawyer Yoo Jung-hwa telling reporters that the verdict was politically motivated and confirming that Yoon would file an appeal.
Prosecutors declined to comment on whether they would appeal the sentence, though South Korean law allows them to do so. In a separate ongoing trial, prosecutors have sought the death penalty, accusing Yoon of masterminding an insurrection by attempting to impose military rule without legal justification and seeking to suspend parliament.
Yoon is currently being held at the Seoul Detention Center on the outskirts of the capital. He has consistently argued that declaring martial law fell within his constitutional authority as president and claimed the move was intended to draw attention to what he described as obstruction of governance by opposition parties.
Outside the court complex, dozens of supporters gathered ahead of the hearing, holding placards describing Yoon as the victim of a political witch hunt. Some signs declared that “history will be the judge,” while others insisted that Yoon remained the legitimate president. Police deployed heavily in and around the courthouse, located only a short distance from Yoon’s upscale apartment in central Seoul.
The obstruction charges stem from events in January last year, when Yoon barricaded himself inside his residential compound and ordered presidential security personnel to block investigators attempting to arrest him.
He was eventually taken into custody during a second operation involving more than 3,000 police officers, marking the first time a sitting South Korean president had been arrested.
Following the short-lived martial law declaration, which lasted roughly six hours, parliament swiftly voted to overturn the decree, with some members of Yoon’s own conservative party joining the motion. Lawmakers later impeached him, suspending his presidential powers, and in April the Constitutional Court formally removed him from office, ruling that he had violated his constitutional duties.
Although the attempted imposition of martial law was brief, it sent shockwaves through South Korea, a key U.S. ally, Asia’s fourth-largest economy and a nation long regarded as one of the region’s most resilient democracies. The case has reignited debate over the concentration of executive power and the legacy of authoritarian rule in the country.
Yoon now joins a long list of former South Korean leaders who have been convicted and imprisoned after leaving office. Among them is former military ruler Chun Doo-hwan, who was sentenced to death in 1996 for his role in the violent suppression of pro-democracy protests in Gwangju in 1980, a sentence later commuted before he was pardoned after serving two years in prison.
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