South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol said on Wednesday he would move to lift a martial law declaration he had imposed just hours before, honoring a parliamentary vote against the measure.

Yoon declared martial law on Tuesday to thwart "anti-state forces" among his opponents. But outraged lawmakers rejected the decree, as protesters gathered outside parliament in the country's biggest political crisis in decades.

Yoon's surprise declaration, which he cast as aimed at his political foes, was unanimously voted down by 190 lawmakers in the parliament. Under South Korean law, the president must immediately lift martial law if parliament demands it by a majority vote. His own party urged him to lift the decree.

The crisis in a country that has been a democracy since the 1980s, and is a U.S. ally and major Asian economy, caused international alarm.