SEOUL, South Korea — Four months after briefly declaring martial law and sending troops to occupy parliament, South Korea's President Yoon Suk Yeol has been removed from office.
In a unanimous ruling Friday, South Korea's Constitutional Court upheld the opposition-controlled National Assembly's decision to impeach Yoon. The court's eight justices ruled that he violated democratic principles and disrupted constitutional order.
He is the second South Korean president to be ousted through impeachment after Park Geun-hye was removed from office in 2017 for her role in a corruption scandal.
Yoon's departure closes a chapter on the political upheaval that began with a surprise televised address on Dec. 3. The sense of normalcy gave way to fears of state violence harkening back to military dictatorship decades ago. Martial law lasted just six hours but prompted a string of unprecedented events, including the first detention of a sitting president in the country's history. People both for and against him poured out to massive weekly protests.
The turmoil is far from over. For Yoon and his subordinates, criminal trials on insurrection charges have only just begun. And for the nation, the deep political and social division revealed and then aggravated by the crisis will likely continue.
Friday's ruling was a crucial step in charting the path forward.
A snap election for the next president will be held within the next 60 days.
In a statement on Friday, Lee Jae-myung, the leader of the main opposition Democratic Party and the most likely person to succeed Yoon, vowed to recover the country's damaged economy and democracy in the spirit of unity.
Uniting the nation over the vast gap between supporters and critics of Yoon will be a daunting challenge for whoever becomes the next leader.
Protesters who called for Yoon's reinstatement fell into silence after the verdict.
"My heart sank. To think that our country will fall into a bottomless pit, it feels like my heart just stopped," says Park Hwang-je, an 82-year-old former Marine.
"The law in this country has already collapsed," he says. "We need to overhaul the constitution entirely, and I believed Yoon Suk Yeol was the person to do the job."
The Constitutional Court details its rulings
As the first judicial judgment on the martial law declaration, the Constitutional Court's ruling confirmed its illegality.
Yoon argued that martial law is justified because the opposition-led parliament paralyzed his government. But the court said he had to resolve the gridlock with political measures, not military actions.
The court also dismissed Yoon's claim that he sent soldiers to the National Assembly to "maintain order."
"The whole nation watched the special forces agents breaking the window and going into the assembly hall," says Noh Hee Bum, a lawyer and former research judge at the Constitutional Court.
"Even when martial law is declared lawfully, there is no legal ground for blocking up the National Assembly or impeding its activities," says Noh.
The court also acknowledged Yoon's violation of the constitution and the law in raiding the National Election Commission, plotting to arrest former judges and banning all political activities under martial law.
"These actions violated the rule of law and the basic principles of a democratic country," the court's verdict said. "They violated the constitutional order and caused a serious threat to the stability of a democratic republic."
Public rapidly reacts to court ruling
As the chief justice Moon Hyung-bae read the verdict, tens of thousands of protesters gathered around the court watched the livestream on large screens set up on the streets.
People calling for Yoon's ouster burst into brief cheers after every acknowledgement of Yoon's wrongdoings and quickly quieted down to hear the following sentences.
And when the order to remove Yoon from office was read, the crowd jumped up with jubilant cries, many in tears.
Among them was Kim Si-eun, a 21-year-old from the southern province of Chungcheong. She says she has traveled to Seoul every weekend to protest.
"I'm so happy and overwhelmed. At the same time, I'm thinking we have come back a long way, but we are going the right way," she says.
"I don't feel that this is the end," Kim says, as the task of reforming society remains. But she says she feels hopeful.
Lawyer Noh Hee Bum says he had expected all along that the court would unanimously confirm Yoon's impeachment, as his violation of the law and the constitution was indisputable.
"He has consistently argued that declaring martial law was within the president's constitutional power," Noh says. "He himself proved that if he is reinstated, he can wield his power as much as he likes through arbitrary interpretation of the constitution."
Following the court's verdict, Yoon issued a brief statement thanking those who supported him and apologizing for failing to meet their expectations.
The former prosecutor general and political rookie swiftly rose to the top of South Korean government, buoyed by many voters' dismay at the liberal opposition and also by deepening partisan polarization. His downfall was just as abrupt.
In the coming days, he will need to vacate the presidential residence. And as an impeached president, he will lose pension and immunity from prosecution.
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