Four things to know about South Korean President as impeachment looms

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SEOUL – South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol triggered the country’s biggest political crisis in decades Tuesday night when he abruptly imposed martial law, only to backtrack less than six hours later in the face of fierce opposition in parliament – including inside his own party – and from the public.

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South Korean opposition parties are now calling on Yoon to resign or risk being impeached, with legislative efforts to remove him from office underway.

Although Yoon is deeply unpopular at home, he has been a willing partner for the United States – and, surprisingly given their historic enmity, Japan – as the Biden administration has stepped up regional coordination to counter an increasingly assertive China and North Korea.

Some analysts said Wednesday that Yoon may have timed his move to take advantage of President Joe Biden’s impending departure and the return to the White House next month of Donald Trump, who has frequently praised authoritarian leaders but who has so far remained silent on Yoon’s moves in South Korea.

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Here’s what to know about the South Korean president.

Yoon became president in 2022 after a narrow victory

Yoon Suk Yeol, now 63, was a political novice when he squeaked into office in March 2022, winning by less than one percentage point over his liberal rival Lee Jae-myung.

Yoon had spent his career as a prosecutor, although he didn’t start until the unusually late age of 33 because it took him nine tries to pass the national bar exam. However, he rose through the ranks to serve as prosecutor general – one of the most powerful positions in South Korea – and notably helped convict former president Park Geun-hye in her impeachment trial in 2017.

The conservative People Power Party chose him as its presidential candidate, with Yoon portraying himself as an aggressive fighter against corruption, which remains endemic in South Korea.

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On the campaign trail, he pledged to take a hard-line stance toward North Korea and to strengthen South Korea’s security alliance with the United States while repairing relations with Japan, a former colonial power on the peninsula.

South Korean presidents serve one five-year term, meaning he won’t be eligible to run for reelection.

His time in office has been mired in controversy

Yoon’s presidency has been marked by unpopular moves, voter anger over increasing prices, and family scandals, which have resulted in record low approval ratings. A Dong-A Ilbo newspaper poll put his support at only 17 percent last month.

He made the sudden decision after his election to relocate the presidential office from Seoul’s historic Blue House and to move the Defense Ministry – costly changes that prompted significant security concerns and had little public support.

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His government was criticized for a lack of preparedness after a crowd crush during a Halloween celebration in 2022 that killed 158 people.

Then there was a crisis in the medical sector, with strikes and staff shortages this year as the government tried to impose changes. In his martial law decree, Yoon mandated that medical workers on strike return to work within 48 hours or face punishment.

Closer to home, Yoon was damaged by a scandal involving his wife, Kim Keon Hee, who was videotaped accepting a Christian Dior handbag from a Korean American pastor, allegedly in exchange for political favors. Prosecutors investigated but declined to charge her over the matter in October.

Yoon didn’t marry until he was 51 – something that is highly unusual in South Korea. He said he connected with Kim, a business executive who founded an art exhibition company, over his casual interest in art galleries. “My happiest memory is finally meeting my wife and marrying her at a late age, in my 50s,” he told The Washington Post in an interview last year.

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But he strengthened the trilateral alliance with the U.S. and Japan

Even as he became increasingly unpopular at home, Yoon was welcomed into the White House – where he enjoyed a moment of fame for singing “American Pie” in front of Biden – in recognition of his hawkish foreign policy and efforts to move Seoul closer to Washington and Tokyo.

Yoon and his Japanese counterpart, Fumio Kishida, worked to break a 12-year diplomatic stalemate and cooperate to counter threats in the region. Yoon showed he was serious about setting aside thorny historical issues from Japan’s colonization of Korea in the first half of the 20th century and counter the geopolitical threats of China’s economic and military rise and North Korea’s nuclear ambitions.

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His efforts to mend relations with Japan have been deeply divisive domestically, fueling the drop in his approval ratings.

South Korea’s relations with North Korea have deteriorated during Yoon’s presidency. While some of his predecessors had balanced security concerns with tepid hopes of improved dialogue, Yoon has taken a harder line with Pyongyang. That contributed to North Korean leader Kim Jong Un’s decision to formally abandon the idea of peacefully reunifying the Korean Peninsula.

Yoon has been stymied in pursuing his legislative agenda

Yoon’s PPP suffered a stinging rebuke during National Assembly elections in April, with its share of the legislature falling six seats to 108, while the main opposition Democratic Party gained 30 seats to take an outright majority of 175 in the 300-member chamber.

This has hamstrung Yoon’s efforts to advance his agenda: Only a small fraction of the bills his government has put forward have been passed.

This appeared to be the main motivation behind his decision to briefly impose martial law. In his announcement Tuesday, Yoon accused the main opposition Democratic Party of “antistate” activities and called the Democratic-controlled National Assembly a “den of criminals” that is “attempting to paralyze” the government.

He also said he wanted to “eradicate pro-North Korean forces,” without citing any specific threats from Pyongyang.

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