By Kim Rahn
Staff Reporter
A former Samsung Group insider was questioned Wednesday over his claims that the conglomerate amassed a slush fund.
It was the second summons, as he voluntarily presented himself before the prosecution the previous day.
Before entering the prosecutors' office, Kim Yong-chul told reporters, ``I am ready to answer whatever questions prosecutors may raise,'' indicating he would actively cooperate in the investigation.
But he warned the prosecution of any plan to limit the scope of investigation. The prosecution said earlier that it would limit the probe as an independent counsel will take over the case in about a month.
Prosecutors questioned him over the allegations that Samsung kept a slush fund in bank accounts opened under its executives' names and bribed key public officials.
A prosecutor said Kim submitted some documents as evidence. Kim said he would submit the list of prosecutors, who he claimed received kickbacks from Samsung, before the counsel launches its probe.
The prosecutor said until the independent counsel is appointed, they will keep investigating allegations that should be probed urgently and necessarily. But he did not talk about whom they would summon.
In the meantime, Hong Song-won, director of Seomi Gallery in Seoul, said Wednesday that she would make available ``Happy Tears,'' a piece by Roy Lichtenstein, which Kim claimed Samsung Group Chairman Lee Kun-hee's wife Hong Ra-hee bought with money from the group's slush fund.
The painting was sold at a Christie's auction in New York in 2002 for $7.1 million. According to Kim, the gallery head bought it at Hong Ra-hee's request.
Samsung said Hong hung it in her home for a few days following the director's recommendation to buy it, but later returned it to the gallery.
The director first said Monday that she had resold it to another individual art collector. But she said Wednesday that no one has bought the artwork after she purchased it at the auction, and that she keeps it in storage.
``I'm preparing to make available the painting to the public this week as suspicion is growing,'' she told Yonhap.
But people in the art field say that galleries usually buy paintings at auctions when requested to by collectors, saying it is unreasonable for a gallery to buy a painting worth billions of won without a prior request and just wait for the collector to purchase it later.
Regarding the list of paintings which Kim claimed Samsung bought through Seomi, the director said it was the list she presented to the prosecution in 2003 when she was under investigation for customs law violation. ``I requested Christie's to send me the list of paintings I bought to submit it as evidence of where I spent money. It was nothing to do with Samsung, and I don't know how Kim obtained the list,'' she said.