SEOUL: South Korea’s impeached President Yoon Suk Yeol failed to appear before the country’s corruption watchdog on Wednesday, it said, after he was summoned for questioning over his martial law bid.

Yoon was stripped of his duties by parliament over the weekend following his short-lived Dec 3 martial law declaration, which plunged the country into its worst political turmoil in decades.

Investigators from the Corruption Investigation Office (CIO) had summoned him to their facility in suburban Seoul at 10am (0100 GMT) for questioning over charges of insurrection and abuse of power. “President Yoon did not appear for his summons today,” a CIO official said.

Yoon’s legal team said on Tuesday he did not commit insurrection and has vowed to fight the charge in court, according to Yonhap news agency.

“While we do not consider the insurrection charges to be legally valid, we will comply with the investigation,” Seok Dong-hyeon of Yoon’s team was quoted as saying.

The CIO said this week that a summons was sent to Yoon but returned “undelivered” after an unidentified person at the presidential office refused to accept it. Yoon’s no-show on Wednesday “will be considered as a failure to comply with the first summons”, a CIO statement said.

Investigators said they were considering despatching a second summons, but CIO chief Oh Dong-woon told parliament on Tuesday they were also “reviewing” whether to issue an arrest warrant.

Published in Dawn, December 19th, 2024