(FILES) South Koreas President Yoon Suk-yeol waves to supporters from his car after his inauguration ceremony at the National Assembly in Seoul on May 10, 2022. South Korea's former president Yoon Suk Yeol resisted prosecutors' attempts to interrogate him by lying down on the floor in just his underwear, lawyers said on August 1, 2025. (Photo by Anthony WALLACE / AFP)
A South Korean court sentenced ex-president Yoon Suk Yeol to 30 years in prison on Friday for sending military drones into North Korea, saying he planned the action as pretext for his disastrous martial law declaration in 2024.
The drone flights two months before Yoon suspended civilian rule, had sparked anger in Pyongyang, which accused the South of dropping propaganda leaflets as well.
Judges said Yoon intended to provoke Pyongyang “into carrying out armed or equivalent acts against South Korea’s military of people”, according to a summary of their ruling seen by AFP.
Yoon planned to “heighten inter-Korean military tensions and manufacture a national crisis” so his martial law could have been justified, they added.
