Park Geun-hye: South Korean court removes president over scandal
SOUTH KOREA - Park Geun-hye has become the first democratically elected South Korean president to be forced from office, after the country’s constitutional court upheld a parliamentary vote to impeach her over a corruption and cronyism scandal that could see her face criminal charges. Friday’s dramatic judgement brings an abrupt and ignominious end to Park’s four years in office – the most dramatic development yet in a scandal that has gripped and horrified South Koreans in equal measure. Two died in protests after the ruling.
Park will immediately forfeit the executive immunity she enjoyed as president, meaning prosecutors can summon, question and possibly arrest her. South Korea has 60 days to elect a new leader after the court’s eight justices unanimously supported the impeachment motion, passed overwhelmingly in December by the national assembly, which accused Park of extortion, bribery, abuse of power and leaking government secrets. The election, likely to be on 9 May, could see a liberal installed after almost a decade of conservative rule and at a time of increasing tension on the Korean peninsula and in the wider AsiaPacific region. South Korea’s relations with China, the US and North Korea are expected to feature prominently in the campaign. Opinion polls show that that Moon Jae-in, a former MP from the opposition Democratic party of Korea who lost the 2012 election to Park, is the favorite to succeed her. Moon has called for talks with North Korea in contrast to Park’s hard line against Pyongyang, and has vowed to “reconsider” Park’s plans to deploy a US missile defense system, amid objections from Beijing. China’s official Xinhua news agency wasted no time in responding to Park’s impeachment and accused her of dealing “a massive blow to [South Korea’s] relationship with Beijing” by agreeing to host the Thaad missile system. It said the deployment was “very likely to usher in an ice age” for economic ties between China and South Korea, and urged Park’s successor to rethink. North Korea’s state news agency, KCNA, said Park “will be investigated as a common criminal”.
Park is not the first South Korean leader to have been impeached by the national assembly. The liberal president, Roh Moo-hyun, was impeached in 2004, but was reinstated two months later after the constitutional court said allegations of minor election law violations and incompetence did not justify his removal. (TheGuardian.com)