Key events
Here is the scene outside the Seoul parliament:
Justin McCurry
Park said South Korea’s democracy owes much to the pro-democracy protests in the southern city of Gwangju in the 1980s, when Demonstrators are also wounded in the bloody crackdown. “Martial law should only be declared when the state is in a state of emergency or a state of war,” Park said of Yoon’s brief statement on December 3. “But those conditions were not there.”
“Yoon Suk Yeol is the leader of the rebellion,” declared the Rise.
“If it were not for the citizens who had run to the National Assembly; South Korea it would not be different from 1980,” Park Chan-dae said, referring to the 1980 Gwangju massacre that occurred under military rule and said that without the intervention of the South Korean people, the country would have returned to Yoon’s 1980 declaration.
Park Chan-dae, the area leader of the Democratic Party of Korea – the main opposition party – read the plan to impeach the president, including the content of his declaration of martial law.
A national assembly session discussing the impeachment of President Yoon Suk Yeol is now underway.
The President’s party to vote against the accused – reports
Justin McCurry
South Korea’s ruling party has decided to maintain its official position in the vote against President Yoon Suk Yeol’s challenge, local media reported.
Last Saturday’s first impeachment vote was disrupted after most members of Yoon’s conservative ruling party (PPP) boycotted the vote. But PPP lawmakers are expected to vote today.
Opening summary
Hello and welcome to the continuing protection of live coverage of the political crisis in South Korea, where the parliament is preparing to vote again on a motion to impeach the president, Yoon Suk Yeol, after his Attempts to impose martial law failed.
Thousands of people are rallying in the streets of Seoul today in protests and have already taken action against Yoon, hours ahead of the election.
Protests demanding Yoon step down kicked off around noon outside the National Assembly, which will vote at 4pm (0700 GMT) on the impeachment resolution – a week later. The first attempt to remove Yoon due to martial law failed.
Police expect at least 200,000 people to demonstrate in support of their removal.
On the other side of Seoul’s nearby Gwanghwamun square, a mile away in support of Yoon, a stream of love songs and waving South Korean and American flags.
Two hundred votes are needed to make the impeachment, the significant opposition lawmakers need to convince eight parliamentarians from Yoon’s conservative People Power Party (PPP) to switch sides. Seven obliged to this.
Here’s what else happened this week:
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Yoon defended his decision last week to impose martial law I will defy and give a long TV speech on Thursdayvowing to fight to the end in an attempt to remove him from office. He repeated that he wanted to defend the country from anti-state forces
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on Wednesday; Yoon’s office will be raided by the policein an attempt to determine whether Yoon’s actions were considered rebellion. It later emerged that security guards had prevented Yoon from entering the main building
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Yoon, a former defense minister and one of Kim Yong-hyun’s closest associates, tried to kill himself in a detention center in Seoul on Wednesday night.but was omitted by those in charge of corrections. He was arrested on allegations of playing a key role in the rebellion and committing abuse of power, becoming the first person to be formally arrested under martial law.
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Officials of the country’s capital and the chief of the Seoul Metropolitan Police were also detained by sending their forces to the national assembly. Jurists decided on Thursday to indict the capital police and justice officials.
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Yoon was forbidden to leave the country on Monday and Tuesday the authorities prohibited several senior officials from going outincluding Cho Ji-ho, General Commissioner of the Korean National Political Agency. Already under the travel ban were former defense and interior officials and military law enforcement chief Gen Park An-su.