The Untold Story Behind the Impeachment of South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol| Kang Yong-suk

Given the exposure of the opposition party’s ploy, one must question whether President Yoon’s impeachment was ever truly justified. During the second preliminary hearing at the Constitutional Court on January 3, the Democratic Party and the plaintiffs arbitrarily removed the term "insurrection" from the impeachment article. This move was hardly surprising, as they finally recognized that the December 3 martial law did not constitute insurrection under South Korea's Criminal Code. As a result, the plaintiffs requested that the Constitutional Court focus solely on determining whether Yoon’s actions violated the Constitution, without addressing whether they could be considered insurrection in the criminal sense. The court agreed to this request. This decision was made based on the Court's “recommendation” and was done without any consultation with the ruling party.

First, the plaintiffs’ maneuver constitutes a violation of a legal principle. An impeachment article must remain consistent throughout the process, and should there be material changes to the facts, the Constitutional Court must either strike down the motion or at the very least require the National Assembly to revote the article. Furthermore, the alteration to the article would effectively nullify the impeachment motion against President Yoon passed by the National Assembly on December 14. This is because the motion had narrowly passed with the support of 12 ruling party lawmakers, who had voted in favor on the understanding that it would include a charge of insurrection. After the Constitutional Court removed such a charge, these lawmakers insisted that they would not have supported the motion had it not included an insurrection charge under the criminal code and issued a statement denouncing the impeachment as “fraudulent.”

Despite all these developments, the Constitutional Court and the opposition party have blatantly ignored procedural flaws and are pushing ahead with the impeachment trial at an abnormally rapid pace.