By Helen Regan, Yoonjung Seo, Gawon Bae, CNN
(CNN) — It took just 11 days for South Korean lawmakers to impeach former President Yoon Suk Yeol after he declared martial law and threatened to unravel decades of hard-won democracy.
Now, 14 months after that ill-fated announcement, which led to lawmakers forcing their way past soldiers and police to enter parliament and security forces deployed to the election commission’s offices, Yoon has been convicted of leading an insurrection and sentenced to life in prison.
Yoon’s reckoning is the result of South Korea’s mammoth push to hold a head of state accountable for almost tearing up his nation’s democratic institutions.
Though his snap decree only lasted six hours, the crisis threw the country into months of political chaos. Investigators have since alleged the depth of the brazen plot extended to sending secret drone flights into North Korea to try to provoke a conflict with arch-rival Kim Jong Un and justify martial law.
Indeed, when news of Yoon’s address began pinging across her group chats at about 10:40 p.m. on December 3, 2024, Song Hwa said she prepared for the worst.
“At first, I thought there was a war,” Song, 35, who runs an online apparel business, told CNN Wednesday. Her husband Heo Woojin said, “As soon as I saw the news, I just felt this huge, invisible pressure that I had to do something.”
Yoon was accusing the country’s main opposition party of sympathizing with Pyongyang and of “anti-state” activities. The military decree meant all political activities and protests were banned, troops could arrest people without a warrant, and news media was muzzled.
Those draconian measures were never fully enforced. But for older South Koreans the decree brought back dark memories from years of terror under oppressive military rule.
On the night of the decree, the couple, who live in Seoul, hastily fed their cat Mango and jumped in the car with one aim: get to the National Assembly – South Korea’s parliament and seat of democracy in the heart of the capital.
“I had screenshotted the constitution,” Song said. Specifically, the part where it says the National Assembly can request the lifting of martial law with a quorum vote.
Heo said they took a longer route than normal, thinking the major highways across the Han River that snakes through the capital, or leading to the state broadcaster, would be blocked by security forces.
But their path was clear. At about 11:30 p.m. they parked their car near the legislature as helicopters buzzed overhead.
“The chopper noise was really loud and it was sleeting. It felt like a scene in a movie,” Heo said.
Hundreds of people were already gathered at the front gate of parliament in the freezing December night, they said. Meanwhile, on the steps of the assembly building, protesters and lawmakers were facing off against troops who had blocked the entrance.
Lawmakers forced their way inside to reach the inner chamber, where they could vote down the military decree. Outside, one politician grabbed a soldier’s rifle in what became one of the defining images from that night, saying that she felt like the “last line” of defense preventing security forces from accessing parliament.
Others piled up furniture to barricade the door