Impeachment Park Geun Hye

Procedure

According to paragraph 1 of Article 65 of Chapter 3 of the Constitution of the Republic of Korea , the National Assembly has the right to impeach any government official, including the president, prime minister and members of the board of the Constitutional Court, if they violated the Constitution or other laws of the country in the exercise of their duties. According to the second paragraph of the same article, the question of impeachment of the president must be put to a vote on behalf of a simple majority of parliamentarians, and for its adoption must receive the support of a qualified majority - two-thirds of parliamentarians. ^[2]

In accordance with Article 111 of Chapter 6 of the South Korean Constitution, the final decision on this issue is in the jurisdiction of the board of the Constitutional Court, and, according to paragraph 1, article 113 of the same chapter, six out of nine members of the board are required to make a decision. ^[2] The court has 180 days to hear the accusations of the parliament and the defense position of the head of state and to determine whether the alleged violations were proved to the president and whether they are serious enough for impeachment. According to paragraph 3 of Article 65 of the Constitution, the official in respect of whom the impeachment procedure has been started is immediately suspended from the performance of his duties, up to the end of the procedure. ^[3]

History

Although every presidency, since the establishment of South Korean democracy , somehow ended with a scandal, ^[4] current events are only the second case of impeachment of the president in the history of the country. ^[5] The last time the impeachment was initiated in 2004 , when the parliamentary opposition, on March 12 , ^[6] suspended the powers of the then head of state for two months, No Mu Hyun , accusing the president and his entourage of corruption, in particular of receiving secret financial assistance for the election campaign, ^[7] - and public, contrary to the statutory provision on the non-partisan status of the president, ^[2] support for the Uridan party - for which the president received a warning from the . ^[8] However, on April 15, the opposition lost the parliamentary elections, losing more than half of the seats in the National Assembly to supporters of the president, and a month later, on May 14 , the Constitutional Court reversed the decision of the previous convocation of the parliament and reinstated the president, ^[6] taking the side of the voters, 70% of which, according to opinion polls, did not support impeachment. ^[7]

Leaked Secret Documents

The scandal erupted at the end of October 2016, ^[9] when received a tablet with more than two hundred secret documents from 2012 to 2014 , including texts of speeches by President Park Geun-hye ^[10] and documents regarding military strategy and national security, ^[11] which, as it turned out later, belonged to her friend Choi Sung Sil , who did not hold any government posts. In addition to privacy issues, the South Korean media raised questions about the fact that the documents were subjected to serious corrections. ^[10] Park Geun-hye and Choi Sung-sil, who has been in Germany since September ^[11] , initially denied all the allegations: ^{[12] the} latter told reporters that she does not know how to use the tablet at all, ^[10] and the official representative of the Blue House , the administration of the South Korean president, called the press statements baseless rumors. ^[11] Later, Park Geun-hye admitted that she often consulted with a friend in the first two years of her reign, however, she did not see anything illegal in this, and her administration confirmed the facts of editing presidential speeches. ^{[11] [12]}

However, ex-government and presidential administration officials insisted that Choi Sung Sil continued to intervene in public policy after 2014 , ^[11] and one of the former employees of her foundation did say that she did not edit, but wrote presidential speeches, as well as gave Park Geun-hye instructions on personnel matters, ^[12] interfering in the work of the , ^[13] and actually running the country from behind the head of state. ^[12]

These accusations were not limited to the internal affairs of South Korea: in the list of documents that, allegedly, according to one of the former officials, passed through the hands of Choi Sun Sil, the Dresden Declaration is mentioned ^[11] - a speech by Park Geun-hye on steps necessary for a peaceful unification Of the Korean Peninsula, which she read on March 28, 2014 , after the ceremony of receiving the honorary doctorate in law from Dresden University of Technology . ^{[14] The} Minister of Korean Unification in 2004-2005 , Chung Dong-yong , said that he considered it was Choi Sung-sil who initiated the tightening of foreign policy with regard to the DPRK , in particular, the termination of cooperation on the Keson Technopark . He emphasized that even at the beginning of February 2016, the South Korean leadership denied any connection between the technopark and the nuclear program of the North, insisting on the continuation of its work, and on February 10 it suddenly changed its position. ^[11] Moreover, Park Geun-hye abruptly changed rhetoric regarding the DPRK, and on October 1 openly called on North Koreans, military personnel and civilians to flee to the South, ^[15] influenced, according to Chung Dongyong and the leader of the parliamentary faction of the Toburo Party Template: Langi-ko , statements by Choi Sung Sil about the imminent fall of the DPRK. ^[eleven]

Corruption allegations

The president’s girlfriend is also suspected of using her influence to receive funds from South Korean business conglomerates , in particular Samsung , Hyundai , SK Group and Lotte Group , transferred to the accounts of Mir and K-Sport public funds controlled by her and their subsidiaries. ^{[9] [11] [16]} According to the prosecutor’s office, which traced the fraud of Choi Sung Sil before the scandal, in November 2015 , after the arrest of the head of Template: Langi-ko , ^[17] these funds were accumulated on their accounts are about eighty billion won (72 million dollars ). ^{[10] [11]}

On October 26, 2016, police raided the offices of both foundations, ^[18] returned to the country of Choi Sung Sil on November 1, was detained on suspicion of gaining access to secret documents, ^[12] on November 8 , at 06:40 in the morning, the prosecutor’s office searched Samsung’s office, ^[17] and already on November 20, Choi Sung-sil and his assistants Park Geun- hye, An Jonbom Template: Langi-ko and Jong Hoson Template: Langi-ko , were formally charged with corruption. ^{[19] [20] The} head of the special investigation group formed to investigate the case ^[11] , Template: Langi-ko , on the same day stated that the prosecutor’s office had enough evidence that the president knew about most of the crimes committed by her friend and, moreover, , was the organizer of some of them, and Park Geun Hye was not charged only because of her presidential immunity. ^[19] Even before this statement, the opposition demanded that the investigators be allowed to interrogate the president. ^[eleven]

In public speaking, Park Geun-hye apologized three times to the people and government of the country, but mass demonstrations demanding her resignation continued. In the first six weeks of protests, Park Geun Hye's approval rating dropped from 30-35% ^[21] to 4%. According to a Time magazine survey, at the beginning of December 2016 , 78% of South Koreans supported the impeachment of the president. ^[22]

On December 3, 2016 at 04:10, Sanho and deputies People’s Party ] and No Khvechkhan ( Justice Party ) put forward for the consideration of the National Assembly a proposal to impeach the president on behalf of 171 members of their factions in parliament and a number of independent deputies to on the grounds that Park Geun-hye violated the laws and the Constitution of the country. ^[23] The ruling Senuri party initially wished the president to voluntarily resign at the end of April 2017, but with increasing protests, opinions about the impeachment of Park Geun-hye were divided. On December 4, some members of Senuri announced that they would vote for the impeachment of the president. ^[24]

200 members of the National Assembly were to vote on the issue of impeachment on the last day of the parliamentary session. Given that the total number of independent deputies and legislators of opposition parties in the parliament was 172 votes, the opposition was required to draw at least 28 out of 128 delegates of the ruling party to pass impeachment through voting. ^[22]

Parliamentary Hearing

On December 8, 2016, the South Korean National Assembly scheduled a hearing on the impeachment of the president at 15:00, December 9, local time. ^[25] As planned, on December 9, the deputies held a secret ballot with 234 votes to 56 declaring impeachment of the president. The speaker of the National Assembly - not belonging to any party - and two more delegates abstained, seven votes were declared invalid. ^[26] Thus, only about half - a maximum of 65 deputies - of the members of the ruling party sitting in parliament showed confidence in the incumbent president, and the number of defectors significantly exceeded what was needed.

Prime Minister Hwang Gyeong took over the presidential office at 19:30 CST, as acting head of state. ^[27] If Park Geun-hye leaves his post - for any reason: both because of the impeachment coming into legal force and of his own free will, the election of a new president will be held in 60 days. ^[3] According to opinion polls, the most likely successors to the current head of state are: Ban Ki-moon , who left the post of UN Secretary General ; Moon Jain , runner-up in the last election , former leader of the opposition majority party, Toburo , and Lee Jameung (mayor of Sonnam ). ^[3]

Constitutional Court Decision

On March 10, 2017, the Korean Constitutional Court unanimously upheld the decision of the country's parliament to impeach Park Geun-hye. Now she has lost her immunity and may be held criminally liable. She also needs to leave the Blue House , a presidential residence in central Seoul. As a result of impeachment, Park Geun-hye will also lose the privileges that were due to her by her presidential status: a life pension of 70% of her salary ($ 10,400), three assistants, a personal driver and free medical care in state clinics. In addition, she will be given protection for only five, not ten years. According to the country's constitution, presidential elections must be held in 60 days ^{[28] [29]} .

Domestic

On December 9 , the day of hearings on impeachment, protesters gathered outside the National Assembly building, where the vote took place, and about forty relatives of the victims of the crash of the Sevol ferry watched its progress. Opponents of the president welcomed the news of impeachment, while her supporters called the parliament’s actions “witch-hunt”, conducted without any clear evidence of alleged violations against Park Geun-hye. ^{[30] [31]} On December 10, hundreds of thousands of people gathered for a festive demonstration. ^[32]

International