The political crisis surrounding former South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol took a new turn on Monday, after the special prosecutor’s office handling his case filed new charges against him. Prosecutors accuse him of abuse of power and “benefiting an enemy state”, following the alleged sending of drones to North Korea aimed at inflaming tensions between the two neighbors in 2024. These charges are part of the judicial process initiated by the imposition of martial law last December, an incident that shook the institutional foundations of the country and led to one of the biggest scandals in recent decades in the Asian democracy, the main ally of the United States in the region.
As Public Prosecutor’s Office spokesman Park Ji-young reported this afternoon (early morning Spanish peninsular time), the team headed by Special Prosecutor Cho Eun-sook confirms that Yoon attempted to provoke a military conflict between the two Koreas – which are still officially at war, after signing an armistice in 1953 – that would serve as a pretext for declaring an emergency regime.
South Korea’s Yonhap news agency quoted Park as saying in a press conference, “(Yon) and others conspired to create conditions that would allow emergency martial law to be declared, which increases the risk of armed confrontation and harms the state’s military interests.”
Park explained that the accusation is based on a memorandum written in October 2024 by the then head of the Counterintelligence Service, in which he urged “creating an unstable situation or exploiting the opportunity that arises” to increase tension and support the decision to announce the extreme measure. According to a spokesman for the Prosecutor General’s Office, the document indicated that the military should target key places of Pyongyang “so that the response is inevitable.”
Investigators also brought charges against three senior military officials involved in the case: former Defense Minister Kim Young-hyun, former head of the Defense Counterintelligence Command, Yoo In-hyun, and head of the Drone Operations Command, Kim Young-dae. The first two are accused of collaborating with the enemy and abuse of power, while the third faces lesser crimes, namely obstructing official duties and requesting the preparation of forged documents to cover up the operation.
In October last year, Pyongyang condemned Seoul’s sending of drones to the North Korean capital to drop leaflets against Kim Jong Un’s government, and published pictures of the remains of a South Korean military drone that crashed. The South Korean armed forces avoided commenting on the alleged operation at the time, a dynamic that continued on Monday. The Ministry of Defense stated that it would not comment while the judicial process continues, Yonhap reported.
Although prosecutors initially considered charging Yoon with “incitement of foreign aggression” — a crime that requires evidence of conspiracy — they ultimately chose the “benefit the enemy” charge, concluding that sending drones led to the leak of military secrets.
The Constitutional Court removed Yoon, 64, from his position as head of state in April, opening the door for justice to move forward with an investigation into other criminal charges related to the events of December 3, 2024. Yoon has since been formally accused of leading a rebellion and is in pretrial detention while the criminal trial in the case continues. If convicted, the former leader could spend the rest of his life behind bars or even receive the death penalty, although there has been a ban on this since 1997.
The special prosecutor’s office led by Zhou is an independent body within the judicial system created in the summer and has extraordinary powers to issue court orders, conduct searches and interrogate suspects, and seek arrest warrants against senior officials if it deems it necessary. Yoon had previously been accused of obstructing his arrest, ignoring legal procedures and his government’s approval to declare a state of emergency.
Throughout these months, Yoon has emphasized that he does not intend to create a military regime, but rather has sought to “alert about wrongdoing by the opposition” (which he accused of sympathizing with North Korea) and “protect democracy from anti-state activities.”
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