After the failed attempt to capture him last Friday
South Korean judges have approved a new arrest warrant for deposed president Yoon Suk Yeol, investigators have announced.
“The requested arrest warrant for suspect Yoon was issued this afternoon,” the Joint Investigation Command said in a statement. Yoon, whose failed attempt to impose martial law on December 3 plunged South Korea into its worst political crisis in decades, has refused to be questioned three times. The Corruption Investigations Office (CIO), responsible for the investigation into the ousted president, declined to reveal the length of his current mandate, after the initial seven-day term expired. If investigators succeed in their mission, Yoon would become the first sitting (but suspended) South Korean president to be arrested. However, they would only have 48 hours to apply for another arrest warrant to detain him further. Alternatively, they would be forced to release him.
South Korean investigators were expecting the issuance of a new arrest warrant for Yoon Suk Yeol today, having failed to execute the first one – which expired yesterday – due to the large deployment of soldiers and security members to protect the deposed president. In the meantime, Yoon remains holed up in his residence in Seoul, apparently not at all willing to answer the judges’ questions about his brief imposition of martial law in the country. The first arrest warrant, issued on December 31, expired at midnight yesterday (4pm in Italy). Last Friday, investigators from the Corruption Investigation Office (CIO) entered his residence together with around 80 police officers but clashed with around 200 soldiers and agents of the Presidential Security Service (PSS) and retreated – to empty handed – after six hours of tense face to face. Meanwhile. the Democratic Party, the main opposition force, announced a complaint against the current president Choi Sang-mok for “failure to fulfill his duties”, after having asked him in vain to order the PSS not to resist the arrest.
