A South Korean court has sentenced former president Yoon Suk Yeol to life in prison with forced labour because of his unsuccessful attempt to impose martial law in December 2024.
The court found him guilty of leading a rebellion, making him the first democratically elected president in South Korea's history to receive the maximum prison sentence.
In South Korea, someone found guilty of leading insurrection can be sentenced to death, life in prison with forced labour or life in prison without labour.
In Yoon's case, prosecutors had asked for the death penalty, claiming that he severely threatened the country's constitutional system by spending troops to surround the parliament and trying to detain his political rivals during the six-hour crisis.
Yoon maintained his innocence throughout the trial and claimed that the investigation is nothing but a "political conspiracy."
He further clarified his actions by saying that he declared the martial law to only alert citizens to what he described as an unconstitutional parliamentary dictatorship by then-opposition Democratic party.
While, his legal team said that "there was no intent to disrupt constitutional order, and there was no riot.”
After the ex-president was handed a life prison, South Korea's national Assembly speaker Woo Won-Shik urged Yoon to apologize to the public, saying, “I hope Yoon repents his wrongdoing and offers a sincere apology to the people," as per BBC.
The verdict was announced 14 months after the insurrection which was described as the most serious threat to South Korea's democracy in decades.
