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The Constitutional Court removed President Yoon Suk-yeol from office on April 4. / Source: Yonhap News

The Constitutional Court removed President Yoon Suk-yeol from office on April 4. The decision came 122 days after Yoon declared emergency martial law on December 3, and 111 days after the National Assembly submitted the impeachment motion on December 14 last year.

At 11 a.m., the Constitutional Court held its ruling session in the main courtroom and upheld the National Assembly’s impeachment motion in a unanimous decision by all justices.

At approximately 11:22 a.m., Acting Chief Justice Moon Hyung-bae read the verdict, stating, “We announce the ruling with unanimous agreement among all justices. The respondent, President Yoon Suk-yeol, is hereby removed from office.” The ruling took effect immediately, and Yoon lost his presidential authority from that moment on.

The Court determined that President Yoon had declared martial law in violation of constitutional requirements, even though the nation was not in a state of emergency on December 3 of last year.

In response to Yoon’s claim that it was a “warning” or “appeal-based” declaration of martial law, the Court said, “That is not a valid purpose of martial law as defined by law,” and concluded, “We cannot accept the respondent’s argument.”

The Court also accepted impeachment charges alleging that Yoon attempted to obstruct the National Assembly’s vote to lift martial law by forcibly removing lawmakers from the Assembly building. It further found credible the claim that he ordered the Defense Security Command to arrest key political and legal figures.

Testimonies from Hong Jang-won, former first deputy director of the National Intelligence Service, and Kwak Jong-geun, former commander of the Army Special Warfare Command—both of which were strongly challenged by Yoon’s legal team—were also accepted as factual.

Regarding the controversy over whether the National Assembly had changed the grounds for impeachment mid-trial by dropping the insurrection charge, the Court concluded that this did not constitute a change in the basis of the impeachment and that the process remained legally valid.