South Korean President Pressed To Resign Over Martial Law Bid

AFP/APP

Seoul: South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol faced demands to resign on Wednesday over his short-lived attempt to impose martial law that was voted down by lawmakers and brought thousands of protesters to the streets.

Yoon’s shock bid to impose South Korea’s first martial law in over four decades plunged the country into the deepest turmoil in its modern democratic history and caught its close allies around the world off guard.

The United States, which stations nearly 30,000 troops in South Korea to protect it from the nuclear-armed North, initially voiced deep concern at the declaration, then relief that martial law was over.

The dramatic developments left the future of Yoon — a conservative politician and former star public prosecutor who was elected president in 2022 — in jeopardy.

South Korea’s main opposition party whose lawmakers jumped fences and tussled with security forces so they could vote to overturn the law demanded that Yoon step down immediately over the attempted “insurrection”.