Yoon Suk-yeol is a South Korean prosecutor and politician who served as the 13th elected President of South Korea. He assumed office on May 10, 2022, succeeding Moon Jae-in, whose presidential term ended on May 9, 2022. Rising to prominence through a long prosecutorial career, Yoon became nationally known for leading high-profile corruption investigations involving South Korea’s political and corporate elite.

Yoon Suk-yeol was born on December 18, 1960, in Yeonhui-dong, Seoul, South Korea, to Yoon Ki-joong and Choi Jeong-ja. He attended Daegwang Elementary School, Joongrang Middle School, and Choongam Middle School before graduating from Choongam High School. He earned his law degree from Seoul National University Faculty of Law and later completed a master’s degree in law at the same institution.

Yoon Suk-yeol served for 27 years as a public prosecutor. In 1982, he was exempted from mandatory military service due to anisometropia, a condition that also prevented him from obtaining a driver’s license. He began his prosecutorial career in 1994 at the Daegu Public Prosecutors’ Office. In 2002, he briefly worked as a lawyer at the firm Bae, Kim & Lee, but soon returned to the prosecution service, citing incompatibility with private legal practice.

In 2013, Yoon Suk-yeol led a special investigative team examining the National Intelligence Service’s involvement in the 2012 public opinion manipulation scandal. His reputation as an uncompromising prosecutor was further solidified in 2016, when he served as chief investigator in the special prosecution team handling the Choi Soon-sil scandal. The investigation implicated Samsung vice chairman Lee Jae-yong and then-president Park Geun-hye, ultimately leading to Park’s impeachment and removal from office.

On May 19, 2017, newly elected President Moon Jae-in appointed Yoon Suk-yeol as Chief Prosecutor of the Seoul Central District Prosecutors’ Office. During his tenure, prosecutors indicted two former presidents, Lee Myung-bak and Park Geun-hye, three former intelligence chiefs, former Chief Justice Yang Sung-tae, and more than 100 former government officials and corporate executives. He also launched major investigations into accounting fraud allegations involving Samsung.

Yoon Suk-yeol was appointed Prosecutor General of South Korea on July 16, 2019, and formally assumed office on July 25, 2019, becoming the country’s 43rd prosecutor general. He served until March 4, 2021, when he resigned amid escalating political conflict with the administration. In June 2021, he officially announced his candidacy for the presidency.

Winning the March 2022 presidential election, Yoon Suk-yeol was inaugurated on May 10, 2022, as South Korea’s 13th elected president. On March 20, 2022, he announced the relocation of the presidential office to the Ministry of National Defense building in Seoul’s Yongsan district. Consequently, the Blue House, which had served as the presidential residence for 74 years, was opened to the public.

On May 21, 2022, Yoon Suk-yeol met with U.S. President Joe Biden at the presidential residence in Seoul, reaffirming the South Korea–United States alliance. From June 28 to June 30, 2022, he attended the NATO summit in Madrid, becoming the first South Korean leader to participate in a NATO heads-of-state and government meeting.

Yoon Suk-yeol married Kim Kun-hee in 2012. His presidency later became highly controversial. On December 3, 2024, he declared martial law, accusing opposition forces of collaborating with North Korean communists. The move triggered widespread political and legal backlash.

Following investigations into the constitutionality of the declaration, the Constitutional Court of Korea suspended Yoon Suk-yeol from presidential duties. He was detained on January 15, 2025, and formally arrested on January 19, 2025, on charges including leading an insurrection and abuse of power. Although he was released on March 8, 2025, after a court ruled procedural flaws in the indictment, the Constitutional Court ultimately ruled on April 3, 2025, that the martial law declaration was unconstitutional and ordered his removal from office.

Yoon Suk-yeol’s downfall marked one of the most dramatic political collapses in South Korea’s democratic history, transforming a former anti-corruption prosecutor into a deeply polarizing figure whose presidency ended in impeachment and removal.

Source: Biyografiler.com