{"id":9735,"date":"2025-03-24T11:59:20","date_gmt":"2025-03-24T06:59:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.asiafreepress.com\/?p=9735"},"modified":"2025-03-24T11:59:23","modified_gmt":"2025-03-24T06:59:23","slug":"south-korea-court-reinstates-impeached-pm-han-as-acting-president","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.asiafreepress.com\/en_gb\/asia\/south-korea-court-reinstates-impeached-pm-han-as-acting-president\/","title":{"rendered":"South Korea court reinstates impeached PM Han as acting president"},"content":{"rendered":"

South Korea\u2019s Constitutional Court dismissed the impeachment<\/a> of Prime Minister Han Duck-soo on Monday, reinstating him as acting president \u2014 a role he took after the president was suspended<\/a> for declaring martial law<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The court ruling is the latest development in South Korea\u2019s complex and sprawling political crisis, which President Yoon Suk Yeol started with a short-lived attempt to subvert civilian rule in December.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lawmakers defied armed soldiers at parliament to vote down Yoon\u2019s December 3 martial law declaration and impeached him soon after, with Han stepping in as acting president.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But he was himself impeached by lawmakers just weeks later over his purported involvement in the martial law debacle, plus a dispute over judicial appointments.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe Constitutional Court has rendered a decision to reject the impeachment trial request against Prime Minister Han Duck-soo,\u201d the court said on Monday in a statement.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The court ruled five-to-one against Han\u2019s impeachment, with two judges arguing the case should not have made it to court as lawmakers did not have a super majority to impeach him in the first place.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Han\u2019s actions while in office \u201ccannot be seen as constituting a betrayal of the people\u2019s trust indirectly granted through the President\u201d the court ruled. The decision is effective immediately and cannot be appealed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Han, who immediately resumed the acting presidency Monday, thanked the Constitutional Court for its \u201cwise decision\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI believe that all citizens are clearly speaking out against the highly polarised political sphere. I think there is no place for division now. Our country\u2019s priority is to move forward,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/a>Yoon impeachment ruling<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

The court\u2019s decision was closely watched as it comes ahead of a highly anticipated ruling on suspended President Yoon\u2019s impeachment, the date of which has not yet been announced.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Despite experts predicting a verdict on that case by mid-March, the Constitutional Court has yet to rule, making Yoon\u2019s case the longest deliberation in its history.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The leader of the opposition, Lee Jae-myung, said the verdict on Han should not be \u201cdisrespected\u201d but urged the Constitutional Court to move more swiftly on Yoon\u2019s case.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe entire nation is losing sleep over Yoon Suk Yeol\u2019s illegal military coup,\u201d he said, adding it was \u201chard to fathom why the Constitutional Court continues to postpone the ruling date.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cEvery day, every hour, every minute, every second, the international trust in the Republic of Korea is being broken, the economic damage is mounting,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If Yoon\u2019s impeachment is upheld, South Korea must hold fresh elections within 60 days of the verdict.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Monday\u2019s ruling \u201cdoes not have a direct legal correlation with the pending decision on Yoon\u2019s impeachment,\u201d Yoo Jung-hoon, attorney and political commentator, told AFP<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe judges did not deliberate on the legality of martial law but rather on Han\u2019s involvement in the case,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Yoon was suspended by parliament in December. He was arrested<\/a> in January in a dawn raid in connection to a separate criminal investigation on insurrection charges \u2014 which are not covered by presidential immunity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Yoon is the first sitting South Korean president to stand trial in a criminal case. He was released from detention in early March on procedural grounds \u2014 a move that has appeared to invigorate his supporters.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hundreds of thousands of South Koreans took to the streets over the weekend, as rallies for and against Yoon intensified ahead of the court verdict.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lawmaker Kweon Seong-dong from Yoon\u2019s ruling People Power Party told reporters at the National Assembly that Han\u2019s reinstatement was welcome.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The opposition who impeached him should \u201capologise to the people for paralysing state affairs for 87 days with a hasty impeachment bid,\u201d which was done for political purposes, Kweon added.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

South Korea\u2019s Constitutional Court dismissed the impeachment of Prime Minister Han Duck-soo on Monday, reinstating him as acting president \u2014 a role he took after the president was suspended for declaring martial law. The court ruling is the latest development in South Korea\u2019s complex and sprawling political crisis, which President Yoon Suk Yeol started with a short-lived attempt to subvert […]<\/p>","protected":false},"author":15,"featured_media":9736,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[80,396,342],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9735","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-asia","category-latest","category-politics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.asiafreepress.com\/en_gb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9735"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.asiafreepress.com\/en_gb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.asiafreepress.com\/en_gb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.asiafreepress.com\/en_gb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/15"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.asiafreepress.com\/en_gb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9735"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.asiafreepress.com\/en_gb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9735\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.asiafreepress.com\/en_gb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/9736"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.asiafreepress.com\/en_gb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9735"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.asiafreepress.com\/en_gb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9735"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.asiafreepress.com\/en_gb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9735"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}