Former South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol Sentenced to 30 Years for Drone Flights Over Pyongyang
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A Seoul court sentenced ex-President Yoon Suk Yeol and former defense minister Kim Yong Hyun to 30 years in prison for ordering drone missions over North Korea’s capital, a move prosecutors said was intended to provoke a conflict and justify martial law.
Seoul's Central District Court handed former President Yoon Suk Yeol and ex-defense minister Kim Yong Hyun a 30-year prison term on Friday, finding them guilty of aiding an adversary and abusing power by ordering drone flights over Pyongyang in 2024. The court said the flights were intended to provoke North Korea into armed actions, creating a manufactured national emergency that allowed Yoon to declare martial law.
The ruling follows an earlier sentence that gave Yoon a life term for a rebellion conviction related to his brief imposition of martial law in December 2024. North Korean officials had accused Seoul of using the drones to drop propaganda leaflets, a claim the South Korean defense ministry neither confirmed nor denied.
Yoon's legal team argued the drone operations were a response to North Korea's launch of thousands of trash-filled balloons earlier in the year and warned that the verdict could harm South Korea's security interests. Prosecutors, led by special prosecutor Cho Eun-suk, had sought a 30-year term for Yoon and a 25-year term for Kim, alleging they attempted to create a war-like situation and consolidate authoritarian power.
Yoon declared martial law on the night of Dec. 3, 2024, accusing liberal lawmakers of anti-state activities. The measure lasted roughly six hours before legislators broke through a security blockade at the National Assembly and voted to overturn it, prompting the cabinet to lift martial law. Yoon was subsequently suspended, impeached, removed from office by the Constitutional Court, and arrested in July 2025. Several criminal cases remain pending, and both Yoon and prosecutors have appealed the rebellion conviction, which originally carried a death-penalty request.