Law enforcement authorities are seeking to formally arrest impeached South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol, who is spending his third day at a detention center after his lawyers failed in a last-minute attempt to secure his release.

As 3,000 riot police swarmed his hillside villa on Wednesday, South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol huddled with party loyalists, telling them that people were increasingly realising the country's legal system had been hijacked by leftist forces.

South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol has been arrested for questioning, according to the country’s anti corruption agency, in the latest chapter of a weekslong political saga that began with the embattled president’s shock martial law decree last month.