Ex-spy agency chief's motives behind remarks on classified files questioned

Former National Intelligence Service chief Park Jie-won, right, and Kwon No-gab, an adviser to the Democratic Party of Korea, greet each other at Seoul National Cemetery in southern Seoul's Dongjak District, where a commemoration event for the third death anniversary of former first lady Lee Hee-ho was held, June 10. Yonhap

By Ko Dong-hwan

• Published Jun 12, 2022 4:17 PM KST
• Updated Jun 13, 2022 4:41 PM KST

Experts say it's either a self-serving political move or whistleblowing attempt to warn about NIS' illegal practices

By Ko Dong-hwan

The country's former spy agency chief Park Jie-won has found himself at the center of controversy after he publicly disclosed the agency has been secretly compiling dossiers on politicians, entrepreneurs and journalists. Experts were divided over whether Park made the remarks as a political gambit for personal gain or in a whistleblowing effort to stop the agency from further unethical gathering of information.

The liberal lawmaker, who became chief of the National Intelligence Service (NIS) in 2020 and stepped down last May, posted an apologetic statement on Facebook on Saturday regarding his controversial remarks on a CBS radio show aired last Friday.

Park had said in the show that the classified “X-files” were being collected from the time of the Park Chung-hee government in the early 1960s to the end of Park Geun-hye's presidency in 2017. The files, stored in the government's main computer servers or in other forms of records, contained various rumors and information obtained illicitly, including on how certain politicians made money or which politicians had a romantic fling with which celebrities, according to Park.

“Regardless of the reason, if it is burdensome to the NIS, of which I was proudly a part, and its employees, then I will be more careful from now on in my public remarks," he said in the post.

Park, who returned to the main opposition Democratic Party of Korea (DPK) following his resignation from the NIS, also said in his apology that he had mentioned the files only out of concern that they could be manipulated by lawmakers as means of a political attack.

“I had shared my opinion about the X-files with my colleagues in both the ruling party and the main opposition party as well as journalists,” Park said in his apology. “I only made the remark while I was lamenting that a legislative procedure at the National Assembly over whether to destroy the files or not wasn't finalized but instead fizzled out.”

On Friday, Park said that destroying the files was one thing he couldn't do while he was in charge of the agency and regretted not having done it. “These files are an unfortunate history of both the ruling and the main opposition parties,” Park said in the broadcast. “None of them should be left. So I had insisted destroying them by the National Assembly introducing a special act. But that didn't work out.”

Following Park's radio revelation late last week, the NIS issued a press briefer the following day advising Park to refrain from mentioning its confidential inner workings.

“Whether the existence of the X-files is true or not, the fact that Park, who just stepped down from the agency's chief position, publicly revealed a work-related finding was inappropriate,” the agency said. “It's against the country's laws on NIS employees. Besides, there isn't any precedent of an NIS chief sharing facts related to his work in a media interview.”

Kim Hyeong-joon, a political analyst and a professor at Myongji University, criticized Park's remarks as a political gambit to attract public attention and expand his presence as a politician.

“Why did he have to say such a thing? Because he wanted to show that he knows such information, in other words, that he has that much power,” Kim told The Korea Times. “By mentioning the X-files, he has raised public curiosity and made himself a focal point. It was a highly advanced political strategy and it was inappropriate (that he took advantage of the X-files as a means of political gain).”

Kim pointed out that the discovery of the X-files in the NIS would have been more natural if it came from an official channel used by acting lawmakers, such as a hearing of the National Assembly Intelligence Committee. “Nobody asked him about it. He volunteered the information, which makes it look more like the remark was motivated by his political ambitions,” Kim said.

Bae Jong-chan, director of political research institute Insight K, said that Park's remarks have certainly demoralized the NIS. But he added that Park didn't actually reveal the content of the X-files but only hinted at their existence, intending to raise public awareness on the agency's illegal methods to gain information by secretly monitoring politicians and private citizens.

“Park is also a politician, so he must have a motive to stop the agency's unethical information-gathering from ever happening again,” Bae told The Korea Times. “If he kept mum about the X-files, no member of the public would have known about them. In that sense, I think Park's revelation was an appropriate action.”

Park must have wanted to highlight that tapping people's personal communiques unless it was for a critical national gain is unconstitutional, Bae added. “It's the same reason the country wants to protect an internal whistleblower,” he said. “He didn't unspool the whole X-files. Instead, he just let the light shine on the files' existence to let the world know that the files are smearing the agency's reputation. That, he can certainly say as a politician.”

Yoo Sung-jin, a political expert at Ewha Womans University, also doubted that Park's controversial disclosure was politically motivated. Rather, Yoo said what should be more closely looked at is how hard the former spy agency chief tried to destroy the files.

“The whole kerfuffle is certainly worth paying attention to as it will need to be resolved by an investigation by the central government,” Yoo told The Korea Times.