Roh Tae-woo

Roh Tae-woo (Korean: 노태우, pronounced [no.tʰɛ.u]; 4 December 1932 – 26 October 2021) was a South Korean army general and politician who served as the sixth president of South Korea from 1988 to 1993. In 1987, he became the first president to be directly elected under the current democratic constitution, which was promulgated after a lengthy period of indirect elections under military governments following the advent of the Yushin Constitution in 1972.

Born in Daegu, Roh attended the Korea Military Academy alongside his close friend Chun Doo-hwan. Rising steadily through the ranks, he saw action in the Vietnam War, and by 1979 he was a major general and commanded the White Horse Division. In that capacity, Roh played a key role in the December 1979 military coup that brought Chun to power, and supported Chun's violent crackdown of the Gwangju Uprising in 1980. Retiring from the army a year later, he held a series of ministerial posts in Chun's government.

In June 1987, Chun handpicked Roh as the candidate of the ruling Democratic Justice Party in the upcoming presidential election, which effectively handed Roh the presidency. The announcement triggered large pro-democracy rallies across the country that came to be known as the June Democratic Struggle. In response, Roh worked to distance himself from the Chun government and delivered the June 29 Declaration, promising a broad program of democratic reforms including the direct election of the president. He won the election in December with a plurality and was inaugurated on 25 February 1988.

As president, Roh reaffirmed his commitment to the continuing democratization of South Korean politics. He oversaw the merger of his Democratic Justice Party with Kim Young-sam's Reunification Democratic Party and Kim Jong-pil's New Democratic Republican Party to form the Democratic Liberal Party. Shortly after inauguration, he presided over the 1988 Summer Olympics in Seoul. In foreign affairs, Roh pursued the policy of Nordpolitik and established diplomatic ties with the Soviet Union and China. Relations with North Korea improved during his presidency, and the two Koreas were simultaneously admitted into the United Nations in 1991. Barred from running for a second term, Roh was succeeded by Kim Young-sam in 1993.

In 1996, Roh and Chun were convicted for corruption as well as their roles in the 1979 coup and the Gwangju massacre; Roh was sentenced to 17 years in prison while Chun was given a life sentence. Both were pardoned the following year by President Kim Young-sam on advice of incoming President-elect Kim Dae-jung. Roh died on 26 October 2021, at the age of 88.