South Korea's leader faces impeachment calls

South Korea's ruling party leader, Han Dong-hoon, said that President Yoon Suk Yeol should be immediately suspended from his duties after declaring the short-lived martial law last week.

Han also said the only way to do so is for the ruling party lawmakers to vote for impeachment.

In a televised speech, South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol said North Korea may have hacked the country's elections, and defended last week's short-lived martial law order as a legal move to protect democracy.

South Korean residents said they were mostly supportive of efforts to impeach their embattled President Yoon Suk Yeol after he vowed to “fight on”, denouncing his opponents as "anti-state forces”.

In a lengthy address broadcast on television, Yoon said the opposition was "dancing the sword dance of madness" by trying to drag a democratically elected president from power, nine days after his aborted attempt to grant sweeping powers to the military.

South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol lashed out at his political opponents as "anti-state forces", said North Korea has hacked the country's elections and defended his short-lived martial law order as a legal move to protect democracy.

His comments came as the leader of Yoon's own party said the president had shown no signs of resigning and must be impeached.

"I will fight to the end," Yoon said near the end of a lengthy address broadcast on television.

He faces a second impeachment vote in parliament expected, a week after the first one failed because most of the ruling party boycotted the vote. Yoon is under criminal investigation for alleged insurrection over the botched December 3 martial law declaration, which sparked the biggest political crisis in South Korea in decades.