By Kwon Mee-yoo
Staff Reporter
Nowon District Office filed a complaint with the police against residents who criticized them for exhibiting living tigers in a transparent booth at the ward office earlier this year.
The district charged seven people, including a middle school student, who denounced the display through abusive words and personal attacks.
The suit was filed under the name of Lee No-gun, the ward chief.
"We can accept healthy criticism, but the foul language on the district's Web site was too much," a district official said.
The ward office held a special exhibition on animals, displaying some 200 stuffed animals celebrating the Year of Tiger from Dec. 23 until the end of February.
During that time, two eight-month-old tigers from a zoo in North Gyeongsang Province were put on display in a transparent cube around 8 square meters large from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. on the first floor of the ward office.
Locking up living animals in such a small box aroused the issue of animal maltreatment and civic organizations rallied in front of the office and leveled accusations at the district head.
The tigers were returned to the zoo in late January, one month earlier than originally planned.
However, the ward office's complaint against the civilians is raising disputes.
The Lawyers for a Democratic Society, a civic group of lawyers, said insulting remarks made about public goods is legal based on general precedents.
Government agencies and local governments have been increasingly active in filing complaints against criticism from the public.
Recently, the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism sued the person who edited a news clip of Culture Minister Yu In-chon and figure skater Kim Yu-na for libel.
The ministry official claimed that the video was edited as if the Minister had tried to molest Kim.
They later said they would withdraw charges if the distributor showed regret for what he did.