South Korea's Supreme Court has upheld a seven-year prison sentence for former President Yoon Suk Yeol, finalising the country's first top-court ruling against a leader tied to his failed 2024 martial law declaration.
The third panel of the Supreme Court rejected appeals from both the defence and prosecutors, affirming the appellate court's seven-year term handed down after a first-instance court had sentenced Yoon to five years.
Yoon was convicted of deploying presidential security agents to block investigators from arresting him in the early stages of the probe into the martial law episode. He was also found guilty of abuse of power for convening only a partial cabinet before declaring martial law, denying nine ministers their right to deliberate, and for fabricating and destroying official martial law documents while directing false information to foreign media. Prosecutors had sought a 10-year term.