Protests intensify as Yoon Suk Yeol impeachment ruling nears

SEOUL - Protests intensified over the weekend as the Constitutional Court is likely to hand down its verdict on suspended President Yoon Suk Yeol’s impeachment this week.

On March 16, members of the main opposition Democratic Party of Korea joined people rallying for Mr Yoon’s impeachment to march some 8.7km from the National Assembly in Yeouido of western Seoul to near Gwanghwamun, crossing the Han River via Mapo Bridge.

The march was the fifth consecutive one in five days since March 12, calling on the Constitutional Court to uphold the Parliament’s motion to impeach Mr Yoon.

Representive Park Chan-dae, floor leader of the Democratic Party, urged the Constitutional Court to swiftly hand down its verdict to remove Mr Yoon from office as he led the march on Sunday, saying that the social anxiety and confusion, as well as damage to the economy, are growing the longer the ruling is delayed.

This march followed a mass rally in front of Gwanghwamun, the main and largest gate of Gyeongbokgung, and symbolic site of government since early in the Joseon era (1392-1910). While police estimate some 42,500 protesters gathered in front of the gate calling for Mr Yoon’s removal, the Democratic Party estimated that some one million people rallied there on March 15, after consecutive daily protests the previous week.

In the view of the main opposition, a ruling rejecting the motion to impeach Mr Yoon would signal that martial law can be imposed to silence a president’s critics.

Dismissing the impeachment would be “a shortcut to a backwards dictatorship where terrorism runs rampant, and turning South Korea into a living hell”, Floor Leader Park said on March 15.

The opposition blamed Mr Yoon for the US Department of Energy’s designation of South Korea as a “sensitive” country shortly before former US President