South Korea’s President refuses to answer questions

South Korea’s impeached President was refusing to answer questions on Thursday, a day after surrendering to police.

Impeached South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol, centre, leaves for the Seoul detention centre on Wednesday night. Picture: Getty Images

South Korea’s impeached President was refusing to answer questions on Thursday, a day after surrendering to police and corruption investigators at the climax of a tense six-hour operation at his fortified residential compound in Seoul.

The Constitutional Court was also to hold its second hearing in a trial that will decide whether to uphold Yoon Suk Yeol’s impeachment, following the dawn raid that made him the country’s first sitting president to be detained.

The former star prosecutor, who faces charges of insurrection, was questioned for hours on Wednesday but exercised his right to remain silent before being moved to a detention centre.

Investigators from the Corruption Investigation Office were due to resume Mr Yoon’s questioning on Thursday but his lawyer said he could not take part for health reasons. “President Yoon is not well and fully explained his position yesterday so there is nothing more to be interrogated about,” Yoon Kab-keun told Yonhap news agency in an apparent reference to his Wednesday decision to not answer questions.

CIO officials declined to comment.

Wednesday’s arrest saw a hundreds-strong force of police and investigators bypass bus barricades, cut barbed wire and scale ladders to get inside the compound where Mr Yoon was surrounded by hundreds of guards.

He said he had complied with investigators to avoid “bloodshed” but did not accept the legality of the investigation.

Meanwhile, officials were trying to secure a new warrant that could hold him for longer than 48 hours.

AFP