By 
Yoon Suk Yeol has become South Korea’s first sitting president to be arrested after investigators scaled barricades and cut through barbed wire to take him into custody.
Yoon, 64, is being investigated on charges of insurrection for a failed martial law order on 3 December that plunged the country into turmoil.
He has also been impeached by parliament and suspended from office – but will not be removed from his position until the Constitutional Court rules on his impeachment.
BBC reported that Yoon’s dramatic arrest on Wednesday, however, brings to an end a weeks-long standoff between investigators and his presidential security team.
Investigators from the Corruption Investigation Office for High-ranking Officials (CIO) failed to arrest him on 3 January after being locked in a six-hour standoff with his security detail.
But just before dawn on Wednesday, a team of investigators arrived at his residence in central Seoul, armed with ladders to climb over buses blocking its entrance and bolt croppers to cut through the barbed wire.
Other officers in the arrest team, which numbered around 1,000, scaled walls and hiked up nearby trails to reach the presidential residence.
After several hours, authorities announced that Yoon had been arrested.
In a three-minute video released just before his arrest, the 64-year-old leader said he would cooperate with the investigators, while repeating previous claims that the warrant was not legally valid.
He said he witnessed how authorities “invaded” his home’s security perimeter with fire equipment.
“I decided to appear before the CIO, even though it is an illegal investigation, in order to prevent any unsavoury bloodshed,” he said.
On Wednesday afternoon, investigators said Yoon had remained silent throughout questioning.
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