Opposition to grill judge-nominee over wealth

By Jung Sung-ki

The main opposition Democratic Party (DP) pledged once again Wednesday to scrutinize Constitutional Judge-nominee Park Han-cheol during a parliamentary confirmation hearing scheduled for Thursday.

The party has accused Park, a former head of the Seoul Eastern District Prosecutors’ Office, of having been treated in a privileged manner when he joined Kim & Chang, the largest law firm in the country. He is said to have earned about 400 million won in four months between September and December last year.

The DP took issue with such preferential treatment for a former prosecutor when the party scrutinized chief state auditor-designate Chung Tong-ki earlier this month. Chung eventually gave up his candidacy.

Park denies the allegation. He said of the 400 million won, 100 million won was his severance pay, and 100 million won was the price of a luxury sedan provided by the law firm. As a result, Park argued he only received 200 million won from the company.

The opposition party is also taking issue with Park’s political impartiality.

When Park served as a senior prosecutor dealing with public safety in 2008, the DP claims he led the suppression of candlelit protests against Seoul’s decision to resume imports of U.S. beef, thereby infringing on the freedom of expression.

Korea, once one of the top three importers of U.S. beef, banned the meat in 2003 after an outbreak of mad cow disease. In 2008, the Lee Myung-bak government announced it would import most cuts of beef, including ribs which had previously been banned, from cattle aged less than 30 months.

But scaremongers spread rumors among the public via the Internet after a television show alleged Koreans were genetically more likely to contract the brain-wasting disease than Westerners.

Park is also said to have been involved in arresting Minerva, an Internet user who wrote on the Korean economy, criticizing the economic policies of the Lee administration.

Prosecutors arrested Minerva, whose real name is Park Dae-sung, in 2009 and charged him with electronically spreading false rumors that damage the public good.

The Constitutional Court recently acquitted him of the charge, saying the Electronic Communications Law was unlawful and the definition of public interest was too ambiguous and abstract to punish him.

The Constitutional Court, which has nine justices, is an independent and specialized court, whose primary role is reviewing the constitutionality of controversial issues.

It has administrative law functions such as ruling on competence disputes between government entities, giving final decisions on impeachments, and making judgments on the dissolution of political parties.