Then-President Yoon Suk-yeol declares emergency martial legislation throughout an emergency deal with from the presidential workplace in Seoul on the night of Dec. 3, 2024. (Shin So-young/Hankyoreh)
Yoon Suk-yeol declared martial legislation on Dec. 3, 2024, with the target of eradicating political opponents and seizing broad energy for himself, investigators led by the particular counsel Cho Eun-seok concluded on Monday upon finishing a 180-day inquiry into the disaster that shocked Koreans final December.
Nonetheless, some see the probe’s failure to find out why Yoon selected Dec. 3 to hold out his gambit, in addition to its lack of readability on alleged acts of treason, as shortcomings.
Throughout a briefing on Monday saying the ultimate findings of his workforce’s investigation, Cho mentioned that Yoon had begun preparations for martial legislation “previous to October 2023,” and that the previous president had “tried to forcibly halt political actions and hamper the capabilities of the Nationwide Meeting by mobilizing the navy.”
“We confirmed that he declared martial legislation to determine an emergency legislative organ that may change the Nationwide Meeting, by which he deliberate to wrest management of the legislative and judicial branches to take away opponents and monopolize and retain energy,” he added.
Cho has remained out of the highlight all through his workforce’s six-month inquiry into final 12 months’s disaster. On Monday, nonetheless, he personally introduced his workforce’s findings.
Primarily based on writings in a pocket book discovered within the possession of Roh Sang-won, a former Protection Intelligence Command chief suspected of being the actual mastermind behind the botched self-coup try, and different proof, the particular counsel mentioned that Yoon started plans for martial legislation earlier than October 2023, and that he began planting the concept of the need of martial legislation within the heads of key navy leaders in March of final 12 months.
From then on, the particular counsel argued, he plotted with former Protection Minister Kim Yong-hyun to prepare navy management in preparation to declare martial legislation.
Cho Eun-seok, the particular counsel who oversaw an unbiased investigation into final 12 months’s martial legislation disaster and alleged acts of rebellion and treason, declares the findings of his workforce’s investigation on Dec. 15, 2025, on the Seoul Excessive Prosecutors’ Workplace within the metropolis’s Seocho District. (Yonhap)
The particular counsel concluded that preparations for martial legislation occurred within the type of personnel reshuffles within the navy as effectively.
Shin Gained-sik, who voiced opposition to the plan to declare martial legislation in September and October of final 12 months, was changed as protection minister by Kim Yong-hyun, who was the pinnacle of the Presidential Safety Service on the time.
Park An-su, the chief of employees of the Republic of Korea Military on the time, apparently ensured that generals amenable to Yoon’s plans had been those lined up for promotions.
After forming his martial legislation lineup, Yoon and his aides led an “irregular navy operation” to impress North Korea into partaking in an armed conflict to justify declaring martial legislation. However when that failed, Yoon declared that the Democratic Celebration had inflicted a “paralysis in governance” to justify martial legislation, the particular counsel concluded.
Concerning remarks that Yoon reportedly made in November 2022 about pointing weapons at politicians and “mowing them down,” Cho mentioned that they “affirm that he supposed to model all opposition as ‘anti-state forces’ and deliberate to take away them underneath martial legislation.”
Since launching its investigation on June 18, the particular counsel workforce has targeted its efforts on uncovering how key figures within the Yoon administration could have aided or abetted rebellion and treason.
After Yoon was launched from pre-trial detention after a courtroom order in March, the particular counsel workforce indicted him once more on costs of aggravated obstruction of justice. It additionally indicted former Prime Minister Han Duck-soo, former Inside Minister Lee Sang-min, and former Justice Minister Park Sung-jae on costs of aiding within the rebellion.
The particular counsel additional indicted Yoon, Kim Yong-hyun, and Yeo In-hyeong of the Protection Counterintelligence Command on costs of treason within the type of an operation that had concerned flying drones over Pyongyang with the intention to induce a response from North Korea and incite public paranoia about North Korea.
Following Cho’s briefing on his investigation’s findings, the ruling Democratic Celebration known as for a second particular counsel investigation, arguing that the actual motives behind the rebellion and suspected treason had not been revealed.
By Jung Hwan-bong, employees reporter; Kang Jae-gu, employees reporter
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