South Korean investigators sought to arrest impeached President Yoon Suk Yeol at his residence on Friday over a failed martial law effort, but local media reported that security forces were blocking their efforts.
Yoon, who has already been suspended from duty by lawmakers, would become the first sitting president to be arrested in South Korean history if the warrant is executed.
The president, who issued a confusing declaration on December 3 that shook the vibrant East Asian democracy and pushed it briefly back into the dark days of military rule, faces prison or, in a worst-case scenario, the death penalty. Will have to.
“The execution of the arrest warrant for President Yoon Suk Yeol has begun,” said the Corruption Investigation Office (CIO), which is investigating Yoon’s short-term declaration of martial law, which sent officials and police into the presidential residence. Seen entering.
AFP journalists observed CIO investigators, including senior prosecutor Lee Dae-hwan, being allowed to enter the residence through heavy security barricades to attempt to execute their warrant to detain Yoon.
But after entering they were “stopped inside by a military unit”, Yonhap news agency reported.
They later “moved on” from that unit to “confront the security service” inside the residence.
It was unclear whether the Presidential Security Service, which still protects Yun as the country’s current head of state, would pursue investigators’ warrants.
Members of his security team had previously blocked an attempted police raid on the presidential residence, but it was not immediately clear which units had blocked investigators on Friday.
Yoon’s legal team condemned the attempt to execute an arrest warrant, and vowed to take further legal action against the move.
Yoon’s lawyer Yoon Kap-kyun said, “The execution of the illegal and invalid warrant is not actually lawful.”
AFP correspondents saw dozens of police buses and hundreds of uniformed policemen lined up on the road outside the compound in central Seoul.
About 2,700 police and 135 police buses have been deployed to the area to prevent clashes after Yoon’s supporters clashed with anti-Yoon protesters on Thursday, Yonhap reported.
Yoon has been hiding inside the residence since a court approved a warrant to detain him earlier this week, vowing to “fight” authorities seeking to interrogate him over his failed martial law bid. Have eaten.
all night prayers
South Korean media have reported that CIO officials want to arrest Yoon and take him to their office in Gwacheon, near Seoul, for questioning.
After that he can be detained for 48 hours on the existing warrant. Investigators will have to apply for another arrest warrant to keep him in custody.
After staging chaotic protests on Thursday, a handful of Yoon’s supporters, including far-right YouTube personalities and evangelical Christian evangelists, camped outside his compound throughout the night – some holding all-night prayer sessions.
They chanted “The illegal warrant is invalid” early Friday calling for the arrest of opposition leader Lee Jae-myung as police and media gathered outside the residence.
Yoon supporter Rae Kang-san told AFP that many people were “on the president’s side” to avoid attempted arrest.
Yoon supporter Lee Hye-suk, 57, said protesters were trying to stop opposition figures from “attempting to turn our country into a socialist state similar to North Korea.”
Yoon has doubled down on claims that the opposition was colluding with South Korea’s communist enemies.
Yun’s lawyer confirmed to AFP on Thursday that the impeached leader remained inside the presidential compound.
Yoon’s legal team had already filed an injunction in the Constitutional Court to block the warrant, calling the arrest order an “unlawful and invalid act”, and had also filed an objection to the Seoul court that issued the order.
But CIO chief Oh Dong-woon has warned that anyone trying to prevent authorities from arresting Yoon could face prosecution.
Along with the summons, a Seoul court also issued search warrants for his official residence and other locations, a CIO official told AFP.
South Korean authorities have previously failed to execute similar arrest warrants for lawmakers in 2000 and 2004, because party members and supporters blocked police for seven days after the warrants were valid.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
