The impeached former president has refused questioning three times since his bungled December 3 martial law decree.
South Korea’s anticorruption agency says it has received an extension to the court warrant to arrest impeached President Yoon Suk-yeol.
The Corruption Investigation Office for High-Ranking Officials (CIO) on Tuesday did not immediately confirm how long the warrant would remain effective. After a previous attempt to arrest Yoon was blocked by the Presidential Security Service last week, the investigators applied to have the warrant, which was due to expire on Monday, extended.
The Seoul Western District Court had initially issued a warrant to arrest Yoon, and a separate warrant to search his residence, after he defied authorities by refusing to appear for questioning over the December 3 martial law decree.
Dozens of anticorruption agency investigators and assisting police officers attempted to arrest Yoon on Friday, but retreated from his residence in Seoul after a tense standoff with the Presidential Security Service that lasted more than five hours.
The standoff has persisted in the interim. Many of Yoon’s supporters have been camped outside the presidential residence despite freezing weather.
On Monday, lawmakers from his People Power Party turned up in front of his residence and police, blocking roads.
However, the investigators have not yet made another attempt to arrest the impeached head of state.
‘Sincere apologies’
CIO chief Oh Dong-woon apologised on Tuesday for the failed first arrest attempt, saying he was “heartbroken”.
“I must express my sincere apologies to the public for the failure to execute the arrest warrant due to the security measures taken by the Presidential Security Service,” he told lawmakers at the National Assembly.
The CIO was set up less than four years ago and has fewer than 100 staff, who are yet to prosecute a single case.
Yoon is being investigated on charges of “insurrection” and, if formally arrested and convicted, faces a prison sentence or even the death penalty. His failed martial law decree plunged South Korea into its worst political crisis in decades.
He would also become the first sitting president in South Korean history to be arrested. His lawyers repeatedly said the initial warrant was “unlawful” and “illegal”, pledging to take further legal action against it.
They have argued the CIO lacks the authority to investigate because insurrection is not included in the list of offences it can probe.
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