SEOUL — South Korea's Supreme Court upheld a seven-year prison sentence for former President Yoon Suk Yeol on July 9, 2026. This ruling is the first from his criminal trials related to his 2024 imposition of martial law to reach the nation's highest court.

The Supreme Court affirmed an April ruling by the Seoul High Court. The Seoul High Court found Yoon guilty of infringing on Cabinet members' right to deliberate before he declared martial law. He was also found guilty of falsifying the official martial law proclamation to cover up the lapse before later destroying the document. Additionally, the Seoul High Court found him guilty of deploying presidential security forces to illegally resist law enforcement efforts to arrest him weeks after his impeachment.

Martial law lasted only hours before lawmakers voted to repeal it on December 3, 2024. Lawmakers broke through a blockade of heavily armed soldiers and police at Seoul's National Assembly to cast their votes. Yoon's Cabinet lifted the martial law measure after the vote.

Yoon called 11 Cabinet members to his office shortly before declaring martial law on late-night television on December 3, 2024. Then-Prime Minister Han Duck-soo testified that Yoon unilaterally informed him of the martial law decision without inviting deliberation. The Seoul High Court stated that Yoon violated the rights of nine other Cabinet members by failing to call them to the meeting or notifying them too late.

Yoon did not attend the Supreme Court ruling, and he remains in detention. His legal team expressed "deep regret" over the Supreme Court's ruling. They said the justices concluded the case without sufficient review.

The Constitutional Court removed Yoon from office in April 2025. That court found his martial law decree lacked legal grounds and failed to follow required procedures. Yoon is currently standing trial in other cases, including an appeal of a life sentence for the charge of rebellion. He is also appealing a 30-year prison term in a case accusing him of ordering drone flights in 2024 to deliberately heighten tensions with North Korea. Yoon's lawyers stated that the drone flights were a response to North Korea flying thousands of trash-carrying balloons into the South.