Pres. Yoon's martial law justification faces scrutiny

[Anchor]

President Yoon mentioned in a statement yesterday (12.12) the reason for sending military personnel to the National Election Commission during themartial law incident.

He stated it was to check the security system, claiming that the National Election Commission is a constitutional body and that it was uncooperative, making the investigation difficult.

There are criticisms that this reasoning does not make sense, both logically and based on past cases.

Kim Tae-hoon reports.

[Report]

On the night of Dec. 3, when the martial law was declared, military personnel entered the National Election Commission building and even accessed the computer room.

On that day, regarding the deployment of military personnel to the National Election Commission, President Yoon Suk Yeol stated it was "to check the computer system."

This has been interpreted as an intention to confirm the allegations of "election fraud" raised by some, claiming that the military had no choice but to be sent due to the uncooperative nature of the National Election Commission.

[President Yoon Suk Yeol: "The National Election Commission is a constitutional body, and since there are judicial officials as commissioners, it is virtually impossible to conduct searches or forced investigations based on warrants. If they do not cooperate voluntarily, it is impossible to uncover the truth."]

However, the general view is that if there are meaningful clues and evidence related to the allegations of election fraud, investigations can be conducted within the current criminal justice system.

When the so-called "judicial power abuse" allegations arose in 2018, the prosecution searched the Supreme Court's National Court Administration, which is another constitutional body and much larger than the National Election Commission.

Subsequently, for the first time in constitutional history, the Chief Justice was arrested, and the Seoul Central District Prosecutor, who led the investigation at that time, was President Yoon Suk Yeol.

There have already been cases of investigations against constitutional bodies, and it is not impossible to conduct investigations in reality, so the claim that military personnel were deployed to uncover the truth does not make sense logically.

This is also why the legal community points out that the martial law declared citing the necessity of investigating the National Election Commission has a high possibility of being unconstitutional.

[Bang Seung-joo/Professor at Hanyang University Law School: "Isn't there a clear legal procedure in the Constitution for prosecutors or police to conduct investigations and for the judiciary to make rulings? (The declaration of martial law) was clearly an unconstitutional measure that violated the Constitution and laws...."]

Earlier, in the case where five officials from the National Election Commission were reported in April this year for "manipulating the computer system," the police and prosecution concluded the case without charges in August.

KBS News, Kim Tae-hoon.