Facing a complex set of thorny challenges at home and abroad, Lee Jae-myung says he will deal with them with “pragmatism.”

South Koreans headed to the polls in record numbers on Tuesday to vote for a new president exactly six months after the botched martial law decree by impeached President Yoon Suk Yeol unleashed political turmoil.

Mr Lee led the opposition to Mr Yoon’s declaration of martial law, the first such order since South Korea democratised in the late 1980s. By contrast, Kim Moon-soo, the standard-bearer for the conservative People Power Party ( PPP ),