Can NIS chief stand heat?
By Kim Da-ye
Nam Jae-joon, chief of National Intellitence Agency
Nam Jae-joon, chief of the National Intelligence Service (NIS), is facing growing pressure to quit after the prosecution’s investigation revealed some of its agents worked together and spent millions of won to fabricate evidence in an espionage case.
President Park Geun-hye ordered March 10 a thorough investigation into the suspected fabrication, but remained tight-lipped on the prosecution’s indictment.
Observers say that it shows the president’s unwavering trust in and support for Nam and the NIS which directly reports to her.
Rep. Ahn Chul-soo, a co-chair of the New Politics Alliance for Democracy (NPAD), demanded Wednesday in a speech at the National Assembly that President Park immediately dismiss Nam for the agency’s suspected evidence fabrication and a separate case of an alleged smear campaign against opposition candidates in the 2012 presidential election.
Members of labor and civic groups held a massive rally Wednesday night at Chunggye Square in central Seoul, calling for the NIS chief to step down. It was the first legal night protest held since the Constitutional Court’s ruling on March 27 that permits protests until midnight.
Lawyers for a Democratic Society, an association of progressive lawyers, raised suspicion over Nam’s potential involvement in the evidence fabrication scandal.
Members of the association represent Yu Woo-sung, an ethnic Chinese who came to the South as a North Korean defector and later was accused of being a spy.
“The NIS’s anticommunist investigation team had a planning meeting, used a cunning method of manipulating a fax number, and executed an abnormal amount of budget,” the association said in a statement. “The reports on these are very much likely to have been forwarded to the NIS chief.”
The prosecution’s investigation found that the indicted NIS officer’s civilian collaborator asked that 7.4 million won ($7,000) be paid to a forgery technician.
Kim Jung-bong, professor at Hanzhong University and former senior NIS officer, told The Korea Times that the payment to the civilian collaborator is unlikely to have been reported to the NIS chief.
The most senior officer who would be reported to about such a matter is likely the team leader who manages the indicted mid-level officer, the professor said.
Kim said it is also a common practice to pay civilian informants for intelligence they bring, whether it is genuine or made up, in order to keep them in the pool.
Now isn’t the right time to replace Nam, who has vowed to reform the country’s spy agency, Kim said. The NIS reform began early last year after allegations surfaced about the agency’s meddling in the 2012 presidential election.
“If he resigns now, he may also give a wrong impression that he did order the evidence fabrication,” the professor said.
“An NIS chief who makes an order that can put agents’ lives under threat cannot ask them to fabricate evidence. We need to give him more time to reform the agency and step down on his own will, taking responsibility for the whole affairs, not just for the fabrication.”