South Korea: Ex-military commander recants testimony on Yoon's alleged order to arrest lawmakers

Seoul, Dec 15 A former commander of the Capital Defence Command on Monday recanted his earlier testimony that former South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol had ordered him to "drag out" lawmakers from the National Assembly during a failed attempt to impose martial law last December, officials said.

Lee Jin-woo, who is suspected of having played a key role in Yoon's imposition of martial law on December 3, 2024, made the reversal while testifying as a witness at a hearing on charges of insurrection against the former president.

In May, Lee testified at a court martial in Seoul that he found it "abnormal" when the president allegedly ordered him to "kick and break down the door" to drag out lawmakers, Yonhap News Agency reported.

He also told the court he recalled Yoon saying that "four people can take out one person each at the National Assembly building," noting that the memory had come back to him after being reminded by an adjutant.

However, Lee backtracked on his previous testimony Monday, saying his memory had been "distorted" by things he had heard and seen on television and YouTube.

"I did say that at the time," Lee said, adding he had made those remarks because he had found the account plausible after watching television coverage, despite having no recollection of it.

Lee also denied that Yoon used the word "arrest" in issuing the orders, instead claiming he had "imagined" the term after being influenced by TV.

Meanwhile, a special counsel team on Monday concluded that former President Yoon Suk Yeol began preparations for his short-lived imposition of martial law in or before October 2023, more than a year before the December 2024 declaration.

Special counsel Cho Eun-suk's team shared the conclusion as it announced the results of its 180-day investigation into the martial law bid after indicting 24 people, including the ousted former president, former Prime Minister Han Duck-soo, former National Intelligence Service Director Cho Tae-yong and former Defence Minister Kim Yong-hyun.

The team said Yoon staged an insurrection through his martial law declaration in order to remove his political opponents and monopolize and maintain power, contradicting the former's claims that the emergency order was aimed at protecting the nation from a reckless opposition party.

"Yoon Suk Yeol and others aimed to halt political activities and the National Assembly's functions by military force and remove opposition forces by seizing legislative and judiciary powers through an emergency legislative body replacing the National Assembly," Cho said at a briefing at his office in southern Seoul.

“He declared martial law by framing the political activities carried out at the National Assembly as anti-state acts and anti-state forces plotting an insurrection,” he added.

The team said it determined the former president had mentioned his "emergency powers" on numerous occasions to multiple people since the early days of his term, which began in May 2022 and ended abruptly in April 2025 after the Constitutional Court upheld his impeachment by the National Assembly.

For example, at a dinner with leaders of the then ruling People Power Party in November 2022, Yoon claimed he had emergency powers and would "wipe them all out" even if he was shot dead, according to the special counsel.

Then, ahead of a military reshuffle in October 2023, Yoon and his aides began martial law preparations in earnest by considering whether to impose the decree before or after the reshuffle and appointing some of the key figures now implicated in the martial law case to top commander positions, the team said.

Yoon appears to have chosen December 3 as the date of his martial law imposition in order to prevent interference by the United States, where the government was in transition following Donald Trump's election as president the previous month, it said.

No evidence was found to support rumors that a shaman was involved in choosing the date, it was added.

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