By Hwang Jin Young

President-elect Yoon Suk Yeol is a former prosecutor who once held the nation's highest prosecutorial post. He will lead Korea for the next five years.

He resigned as prosecutor-general in March last year, officially announced his bid for the presidency in June that year and entered the main opposition People Power Party a month later. He earned the party's nomination four months later and was elected on March 10 as Korea's 20th president.

Born in 1960 in Seoul, President-elect Yoon is the eldest son of two professors. Graduating from Choongam High School in Seoul and majoring in law at Seoul National University, he passed the law bar in 1991 at age 31 on his ninth attempt.

He began his career at the Daegu Public Prosecutor's Office three years later and built his reputation through special investigations into corruption committed through abuse of power. With about 27 years of experience in the prosecutorial field, he is Korea's first prosecutor to be elected president.

Leading American and British media also covered President-elect Yoon and his background.

The Washington Post of the U.S. on March 9 described Yoon as a "political novice" who lived as a prosecutor for 27 years, while The Wall Street Journal called him a "political newcomer who entered politics only last year" and won the presidency after a close race with Lee Jaemyung of the ruling Democratic Party of Korea.

The campaign team of his People Power Party on the morning of March 9 distributed to reporters a profile showing the "human side" of its candidate.

Team documents said Yoon is 178 cm tall and weighs 90 kg.

He is said to be not picky over food and enjoys eating, especially kimchi jjigae (stew) with pork and spicy doenjang-jjigae (bean paste stew). He prefers noodles over rice and likes janchi guksu (noodles in a light anchovy broth).

In his free time, Yoon is known to take walks with his dogs, visit art museums and cook.

On a TV program, he once fried a rectangular egg omelet on a stainless frying pan to show off his culinary skills.

Based on the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, his personality type is "ENFJ," or that of a righteous social activist. He is considered to have a personality that is outgoing, intuitive and sensitive but premeditative at the same time.

The president-elect was diagnosed with anisometropia, when one eye has far weaker refractive power than the other, and thus earned exemption from the military draft.

He was baptized with the Catholic name Ambrosio while in college but is also well-versed in Buddhism and Protestantism.

He likes baseball and is a fan of the Korea Baseball Organization pro team Doosan Bears.

A figure he admires is British Prime Minister Winston Churchill.

President-elect Yoon married Kim Keon Hee, an exhibition planner 12 years his junior, in March 2012 at age 52. They have no children.

His residence is in the Seocho-dong neighborhood of Seoul's Seocho-gu District, where he lives with his wife and their four dogs Tori, Narae, Marie and Sunny and three cats Aggaengi, Nabi and Norangi.

His personal motto is "work with joy and live happily."


migingko@korea.kr