South Korea's disgraced president struck a defiant tone on Friday morning when a constitutional court unanimously upheld the decision to impeach Park Guen-hye: she did not appear in court and a spokesman said she would not be making any comment nor would she leave the presidential Blue House residence on Friday. "For now, Park is not leaving the Blue House today," Blue House spokesman Kim Dong Jo told Reuters. That changed on Sunday, when Park Geun-hye, 65, who has become South Korea's first democratically elected leader to be forced from office, left the official presidential Blue House residence on Sunday in a motorcade of fast-driving black cars, flanked by police motorbikes.
And, like Friday, the former president who now faces life as a private citizen and the possibility of prison time, was likewise defiant upon arriving at her private home in the Gangnam district of the capital, Seoul: "I feel sorry that I could not finish the mandate given to me as president," a spokesman for Park, member of parliament Min Kyung-wook, quoted her as saying. "It will take time, but I believe the truth will be revealed," Park said in her first public comments since her dismissal.
It was not the first time the former president has had to leave the Blue House compound of traditional-style buildings at the foot of a hill in Seoul.
In 1979, after a nine-day funeral following the assassination of her father, the young Park left the Blue House with her siblings for a family home. She had been acting first lady after her mother was shot and killed in an earlier failed assassination attempt on her father. Now, having lost presidential immunity, she could face criminal charges over bribery, extortion and abuse of power in connection with allegations of conspiring with her friend, Choi Soon-sil. Both women denied wrongdoing.
In a departure from her recent stubborn refusal to accept responsibility for the events that culminated with Friday's Constitutional Court on Friday upholding a parliamentary impeachment vote over an influence-peddling scandal that has shaken the political and business elite, without blaming outside intervention, like for example Russian hacking.
"I take responsibility for the outcome of all this," Min quoted her as saying according to Reuters.
A snap presidential election will be held by May 9. Her dismissal followed months of political paralysis and turmoil over the scandal that also landed the head of the Samsung conglomerate in jail and facing trial. The crisis has coincided with rising tension with North Korea and anger from China over the deployment in South Korea of a U.S. missile-defense system.
Meanwhile, throngs of flag-waving supporters crowded the street outside Park's home as she arrived there about 30 minutes after leaving the presidential palace. She waved through her car's tinted window as it inched its way down the street, with security men in suits walking alongside. She stepped out smiling, the public's first glimpse of her since her dismissal, and greeted supporters.
Supporters of the now former president gather at her Seoul residence on Sunday
According to Korea Herald, loyalists to former President Park Geun-hye flocked nearby her private residence in southern Seoul late Sunday, seeking to bid farewell to the state chief who faced an earlier-than-expected end of her tenure upon impeachment.
Park Geun-hye smiles to her supporters in front of her old home in Samseong-dong
The residential neighborhood in Samseong-dong was crammed with hundreds awaiting the retreat of the former president to her home. In addition to some 800 police officers who kept guard at the scene, a considerable number of Park supporters, including ranking pro-Park lawmakers, former secretariat chiefs and members of the anti-impeachment civic group, were present. Police said over 1,000 gathered. A smiling Park shook hands and exchanged greetings with her former aides and political allies in front of her home, as her followers shouted messages of encouragement.
Rep. Cho Won-jin, a former public affairs strategist of the party and ranking Park aide, was the first to arrive at the scene earlier in the afternoon. Reps. Yoon Sang-hyun, Kim Jin-tae and Park Dae-chul, who have participated in the Taegeukgi rallies to oppose Park‘s impeachment, were also there. “The intention is not so much to offer consolation, but to bid farewell,” said one of the pro-Park lawmakers.
While lawmakers and former secretariat officials retained composure, preparing for Park’s arrival, members of Parksamo -- the official group of Park’s supporters -- let out enraged responses. After Cheong Wa Dae confirmed Park’s departure at 7:16 p.m., some 800 Park supporters became restless, shouting out the former president’s name and cursing the Constitutional Court for its impeachment ruling.
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Elsewhere, the liberal politician likely to become the next president, Moon Jae-in, promised to work for justice and common sense. "We still have a long way to go. We have to make this a country of justice, of common sense through regime change," Moon, who advocates reconciliation with North Korea, told a news conference.
Moon is leading in opinion polls, which show South Koreans are likely to throw out the conservatives after nearly a decade in power and turn to a liberal leader. Moon called on Park to publicly accept the court ruling, which she now appears to have done, however the transition did not come without a tragedy. On Friday, two Park supporters were killed as they tried to break through police lines outside the court, shortly after the verdict. One was believed to have had a heart attack and the other died as the Park supporters attacked police buses. A third, a man aged 74, suffered a heart attack and died on Saturday.
Thousands of Park's opponents celebrated in Seoul on Saturday, where they have been gathering every weekend for months, and demanded that she be arrested. The former president's conservative supporters also took to the streets not far away, though fewer in number. Police were out in force but there was no trouble.
The chaos in South Korea's political establishment comes at a sensitive time for the nation: the country's northern neighbor, North Korea, has been acting in an increasingly irrational fashion in recent weeks, and according to the Predata-Beyond Parallel think tank the odds of a North Korean WMD attack in the next month have topped 60%.
Another ballistic missile launch could provoke an armed response by both Japan and China, and potentially see the deployment of the controversial THAAD missiles recently deployed by the US in South Korea which could further escalate the tension in the region.