South Korea just asked a court to execute its former president

South Korea's prosecutors just asked a court to kill a former president.

Well, execute him. For insurrection.

South Korea's special counsel team asked the Seoul High Court, a few hours ago, to sentence former President Yoon Suk Yeol to death.

This is his appeal. A lower court already found him guilty of insurrection and gave him life in prison back in February. Now prosecutors want the court to go further and make it death.

Independent counsel Cho Eun-suk leads the team that asked for it.

One member of that team told the court they saw no reason to hesitate before handing down a death sentence.

So what's the maximum here, legally? Under South Korean law, the ringleader of an insurrection can only get death or life in prison. Yonhap, through the Korea Times, says there's technically a third option on the books — life without labour. Other outlets just say it's death or life. Either way, death is as far as it goes.

And here's the twist. South Korea hasn't executed anyone since December 1997. Amnesty International calls it abolitionist in practice.

So a death sentence here almost certainly would not mean an actual execution. But it would be the harshest label a South Korean court has ever put on a former president.

Now, how did we get here?

Go back to 3 December 2024. Yoon declared martial law. Prosecutors say there was no war, no incident, nothing close to the emergency the law requires.

Troops moved on the National Assembly compound. The lower court later ruled that was an attempt to stop parliament meeting and to arrest key politicians. Parliament voted the order down about six hours after it was declared.

Parliament impeached Yoon. The Constitutional Court upheld that about 18 months ago, removing him from office for good. He'd already been indicted in custody in January 2025 as the alleged ringleader.