The Constitutional Court unanimously upheld the impeachment of South Korea's President Park Geun-hye on Friday, removing her from office.
The ruling, which was announced by the court's acting chief and televised live, made Park the nation's first democratically elected leader to be ousted. "The negative effects of the president's actions and their repercussions are grave, and the benefits to defending the Constitution by removing her from office are overwhelmingly large," acting Chief Justice Lee Jung-mi said in delivering the ruling. 
"Judging from the series of words and actions (Park has made), there is no will to defend the Constitution," Lee said. "The president's violations of the Constitution and the law amount to a betrayal of the people's trust and are grave actions that cannot be tolerated from the perspective of defending the Constitution." Park was impeached by parliament on Dec. 9 on charges of letting a close friend meddle in state affairs, colluding with her to extort money from conglomerates, and neglecting her duties during a 2014 ferry sinking that killed more than 300.
An election to pick her successor must be held within 60 days and many expect it to fall on May 9.

Source: QNA