'Pro-Park lawmakers abetted perjury'

By Kim Hyo-jin

Rep. Yi Wan-young

Another Saenuri Party lawmaker allegedly told a witness in the corruption investigation of President Park Geun-hye and her friend Choi Soon-sil to give false testimony about key evidence during a National Assembly hearing.

According to the JoongAng Ilbo, Rep. Yi Wan-young, a lawmaker loyal to the impeached President, met with Chung Tong-choon, chairman of the K-Sports Foundation controlled by Choi, prior to the hearing and told him to lie about a tablet PC, the key evidence of Choi allegedly meddling in state affairs.

This report comes a day after one that Rep. Lee Man-hee of the Saenuri Party attempted to get Park Heon-young, a former staffer at the K-Sports Foundation and another witness at the hearing, to also commit perjury.

The two lawmakers belong to a National Assembly panel tasked with investigating the corruption scandal.

The allegation brought a severe backlash from the opposition parties. They raised questions about the lawmakers’ qualifications to be members of the fact-finding panel, calling for their resignation.

“I heard Yi suggested Chung make it look like the tablet PC belonged to Ko Young-tae, a former close friend of Choi, and that it was stolen by JTBC,” Roh Seung-il, a staffer at the foundation, told the newspaper, saying he heard it from Park Heon-young, a former colleague who appeared at the hearing along with Chung.

The corruption scandal surfaced in October after local broadcaster JTBC disclosed a tablet PC presumed to be used by Choi. It contained multiple files including presidential addresses and classified government documents.

Choi was indicted in late November and is now on trial for extorting tens of millions of dollars from conglomerates to set up the Mir and K-Sports foundations, and meddling in state affairs with access to internal government documents. The prosecution cited President Park as an accomplice in Choi’s indictment documents, making her a criminal suspect.

Even though the prosecution concluded that Choi was the owner of the tablet PC, she still denies it belongs to her.

At the Assembly hearing Thursday, Rep. Lee Man-hee questioned Park Heon-young about the computer and he gave the alleged preplanned responses.

During the session, Lee asked, “Have you seen the tablet PC reported by JTBC?” Park responded, “I believe that’s the PC I’ve seen with Ko. He used to carry it around and asked me to buy a charger for it one day.”

Amid the worsening controversy, the main opposition Democratic Party of Korea (DPK) requested the Assembly panel replace the two accused lawmakers, calling their actions a potential crime.

“If it is true that the two panel members instigated the witnesses to give false testimony, it can be defined as a criminal act,” DPK floor leader Rep. Woo Sang-ho said. “This can be a reason to dismiss them from working on the panel.”

Ko and Park Heon-young are scheduled to appear at the fifth televised hearing of the National Assembly, Thursday. Opposition lawmakers are expected to grill them over the “testimony conspiracy.”

Later, Yi Wan-young denied the accusation, saying he met Chung at his request and heard from him that the PC belonged to Ko, not Choi.

“I’ve never asked anyone to perjure themselves,” he said during a panel meeting. “It was Chung who told me that Park said the PC belongs to Ko.”