South Korea’s National Police Chief and Seoul’s Top Officer Detained over Enforcement of Martial Law

AP

10:23 JST, December 11, 2024

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — South Korea’s two highest police officers have been detained to be investigated for their roles in enforcing President Yoon Suk Yeol’s short-lived martial law decree last week, police said Wednesday.

The development comes hours before the main liberal opposition Democratic Party submits a new motion to impeach Yoon as the country’s main law enforcement institutions expand their investigation into whether the president’s declaration amounted to rebellion. The first impeachment attempt failed last Saturday when the ruling party boycotted the vote. The Democratic Party said it aims to put the new motion to a vote on Saturday.

Earlier Wednesday, Yoon’s former defense minister, Kim Yong Hyun, was arrested after a Seoul court approved a warrant for him on allegations of playing a key role in a rebellion and committing abuse of power. Kim became the first person arrested over the Dec. 3 martial law decree.

Police said National Police Agency Commissioner General Cho Ji Ho and Kim Bong-sik, head of the metropolitan police agency of the capital, Seoul, were being held at Seoul’s Namdaemun police station.

They have been investigated for their roles in deploying police forces to the National Assembly in an attempt to block lawmakers from entering the parliament to vote to lift Yoon’s martial law decree, which was abruptly announced on the night of Dec. 3.

The Assembly was also encircled by heavily armed troops, which military commanders say were deployed on the orders of the former defense minister. But enough lawmakers eventually managed to enter a parliament chamber and unanimously rejected Yoon’s decree, forcing the Cabinet to lift it before daybreak on Dec. 4.

During a parliamentary hearing Tuesday, Kwak Jong-keun, commander of the Army Special Warfare Command whose troops were sent to parliament, testified that he received direct instructions from Kim Yong Hyun to obstruct lawmakers from entering the Assembly’s main chamber. Kwak said the purpose of Kim’s instructions was to prevent the 300-member parliament from gathering the 150 votes necessary to overturn Yoon’s martial law order.

Kwak said Yoon later called him directly and asked for the troops to “quickly destroy the door and drag out the lawmakers who are inside.” Kwak said he discussed Yoon’s order with the commander at the scene and that they concluded there was nothing that could be done, ruling out the possibility of threatening the lawmakers by shooting blanks or cutting off electricity.

At the same hearing, senior officer Kim Dae-woo of the military’s counterintelligence agency said his commander, Yeo In-hyung, asked him if an army bunker in Seoul had space to detain politicians and other figures after martial law was imposed. Yeo is considered a close associate of Kim Yong Hyun. Last week, Hong Jang-won, a deputy director of the country’s spy agency, said Yoon ordered him to help Yeo’s command to detain some of his political rivals but he ignored the president’s order.

Kwak and Yeo are among those who face opposition-raised rebellion charges along with Yoon and Kim, and the Defense Ministry suspended them last week.

If Yoon is impeached, his presidential powers would be suspended until the Constitutional Court decides whether to restore his powers or remove him from office. If he is dismissed from office, a new presidential election would be required.

Opposition parties and many experts say the martial law decree was unconstitutional. They say a president is by law allowed to declare martial law only during “wartime, war-like situations or other comparable national emergency states” and South Korea wasn’t in such a situation. They argue that deploying troops to seal the National Assembly to suspend its political activities amounted to rebellion because the South Korean Constitution doesn’t allow a president to use the military to suspend parliament in any situation.

In his martial law announcement, the conservative Yoon stressed a need to rebuild the country by eliminating “shameless North Korea followers and anti-state forces,” a reference to his liberal rivals who control parliament. Since taking office in 2022, Yoon has had near-constant friction with the main liberal opposition Democratic Party, which introduced motions to impeach some of his top officials and launched a political offensive over scandals involving Yoon and his wife.

On Wednesday, North Korea’s state news agency for the first time reported about the political turmoil and street protests triggered by Yoon’s martial law decree. The report mostly attempted to explain the South Korean events though it used its typical abusive language like calling Yoon “a traitor” and his military “gangsters.”

Many experts say North Korea is sensitive to the domestic spread of news on massive anti-government protests in foreign countries because its own people have no official access to international news and could be affected by such events.