2024 South Korean martial law crisis

In 2024, a political crisis took place in South Korea, triggered by President Yoon Suk Yeol's declaration of martial law. On 3 December 2024, at 22:27 Korea Standard Time (KST), Yoon, the then-president of South Korea, announced the imposition of martial law during a televised address. In his speech, he accused the Democratic Party (DPK), which held a majority in the National Assembly, of engaging in "anti-state activities" and collaborating with "North Korean communists" to undermine the country, describing their dominance as a "legislative dictatorship". The declaration suspended political activities, including sessions of the National Assembly and local legislatures, and imposed restrictions on the press. Reports also indicated that Yoon ordered the arrest of several political opponents, including leaders of both the DPK and his own People Power Party (PPP). The move was broadly characterised by both domestic and international media, as well as by South Korean political figures, as an attempted self-coup by Yoon to rule by decree and to reimpose full authoritarianism on the country for the first time since the June Democratic Struggle.

The declaration was opposed by both parties and resulted in protests. At 01:02 on 4 December 2024, 190 legislators who had arrived at the National Assembly Proceeding Hall unanimously passed a motion to lift martial law, despite attempts by the Republic of Korea Army Special Warfare Command to prevent the vote. At 04:30, Yoon and his cabinet lifted martial law and soon disbanded the Martial Law Command. The opposition subsequently began impeachment proceedings against Yoon and said it would continue to do so if he did not resign. Uproar over the declaration led to the resignation of several officials in Yoon's administration, including Defense Minister Kim Yong-hyun, who had urged Yoon to enact martial law shortly before the declaration and was second-in-command of the martial law order. Yoon, as well as other officials of his administration, and military officers were investigated for their role in the implementation of the decree.

On 7 December, Yoon issued an apology for declaring martial law. The next day, the former Defense Minister Kim Yong-hyun was arrested and sent to a detention facility for his role in the martial law order, where he would later attempt suicide shortly before a warrant could be filed against him. On 12 December, Yoon stated that he would "fight to the end" and that the martial law declaration was an "act of governance" to protect against anti-state forces. It is more widely believed that the declaration was motivated by political issues with the DPK-controlled Assembly over repeated impeachment attempts against officials, opposition to his budget, and various scandals involving him and his wife Kim Keon Hee.

Yoon was impeached on 14 December by the National Assembly and suspended from office pending a final ruling by the Constitutional Court on whether to confirm his removal from the presidency. Prime Minister Han Duck-soo served as acting president until he himself was also impeached on 27 December, making Finance Minister and Deputy Prime Minister Choi Sang-mok acting president. However, Han's impeachment was overturned by the Constitutional Court on 24 March 2025, reinstating him as acting president. Yoon was arrested on 15 January 2025. On 26 January, he was indicted for leading an insurrection, becoming the first sitting president to be arrested and indicted in South Korean history. On 4 April, the Constitutional Court unanimously upheld Yoon's impeachment and removal from office over the martial law declaration. On 19 February 2026, Yoon and other figures involved in the incident were found guilty on insurrection charges. Yoon was sentenced to life in prison, while Kim Yong-hyun was sentenced to 30 years in prison.

Background

South Korea has been governed as a presidential democracy under the 1987 constitution, which provides for a strong executive independent of the legislature. Yoon Suk Yeol, a member of the conservative People Power Party (PPP) and former prosecutor general, took office as President of South Korea following his victory in the 2022 election.

Yoon has been criticized for far-right political views. His administration had low approval ratings, reaching as low as 17%, with 58% of the population in a November 2024 survey supporting either Yoon's resignation or impeachment. Yoon struggled to achieve his agenda due to opposition from the National Assembly, controlled by the opposition Democratic Party (DPK) since 2020. In the April 2024 legislative election, the opposition retained its majority, but lacked the two-thirds majority (200 out of 300) required under the constitution to impeach the president.

Yoon boycotted the opening of the National Assembly, even though it is customary for the president to deliver a speech at the event. Yoon also opposed investigations into scandals involving his wife Kim Keon-hee and top officials, vetoing three separate bills that called for a special counsel investigation into his wife, the third occurring on 26 November 2024. On 2 December 2024, the opposition-controlled parliament moved to impeach Board of Audit and Inspection Chair Choe Jae-hae and three prosecutors involved in two scandals surrounding Kim and rejected the government's 2025 budget proposal.

Early planning of martial law

During prosecution questioning, former Defense Counterintelligence Command (DCC) commander Lieutenant General Yeo In-hyung testified that President Yoon first mentioned "taking emergency action" to address "difficult social issues" in late December 2023, which Yeo interpreted as referring to the failed martial law. At the end of March 2024, President Yoon invited the then-Defense Minister Shin Won-sik, National Intelligence Service Director Cho Tae-yong, and Presidential Security Service Director Kim Yong-hyun for dinner and reportedly expressed his intention to "declare martial law soon". At the dinner, Minister Shin and Director Cho expressed their opposition. Minister Shin, concerned about the implementation of martial law, called Director Kim and the then DCC commander Yeo in private right after the dinner to discuss blocking of any such moves. Yeo added that Yoon started mentioning martial law more often following the PPP's defeat in the April 2024 legislative election. Eventually, Shin was shuffled out of the role of Defense Minister to become Director of the Office of National Security, while Kim Yong-hyun was selected to replace Shin in September 2024. The 27 December 2024 unsealed indictment of Kim Yong-hyun revealed that President Yoon met with former Minister Kim, Commander Yeo, and others about 10 times since March 2024 to discuss the imposition of martial law.

Warnings of a plot to declare martial law

In October 2021, years before the declaration of martial law, Yoon made complimentary remarks about the former authoritarian military dictator of South Korea, Chun Doo-hwan. The remarks came during a meeting with People Power Party officials in Busan, during which Yoon said that "many people still consider Chun as having done well in politics, except the military coup and the Gwangju Uprising", later adding that he believed even people in Honam, the geographic area including Gwangju, felt the same way.

After Yoon was elected president, when asked about the possibility of pressure and protests by opposition parties and citizens, Kim Yong-hyun responded with; "Why worry about it? Just declare martial law and sweep it all away." Yoon also began appointing his fellow Chungam High School alumni as high-ranking figures in his administration and the military, a group referred to as the Chungam Faction. Throughout his political career, several of Defense Minister Kim's former high school alumni claimed that his favorite book to read was Adolf Hitler's autobiographical manifesto Mein Kampf. DPK Representative Choo Mi-ae would ultimately confirm this to be true during a televised interview, which added to many people's suspicion that Kim, having risen to such a powerful position within both the military and the government, may have been driven by darker instincts rather than a sense of duty to national security.

In September 2024, three months before the martial law declaration, some DPK politicians began suggesting that Yoon was preparing martial law. Party leader Lee Jae Myung alluded to "speculation about martial law preparations" in his remark, saying that Yoon appointing Kim Yong-hyun as Defense Minister was a part of a martial law strategy to prevent Kim Keon-hee from going to prison. Kim Min-seok, member of the party's Supreme Council, stated: "I have well-founded reasons to believe that the conservative Yoon administration is drawing up a contingency plan to declare martial law." The Presidential Office dismissed this claim as "groundless". People Power Party floor leader Choo Kyung-ho also denied the possibility of martial law, saying "Such theories ... are no more than scare tactics and propaganda based purely on imagination".