Prosecutors filed charges Tuesday against a minor opposition party lawmaker over his alleged embezzlement of state election funds in several local elections held in 2010 and 2011.
Fraud and election law violation charges were brought against Rep. Lee Seok-ki of the United Progressive Party (UPP), who is accused of pocketing around 400 million won ($360,036) in government subsidies for election camps when he led an election campaigning agency.
Nine employees of Lee's CN Communications and four aides to the left-leaning lawmaker were also indicted without detention for their alleged involvement in the case, the prosecutors said.
The agency exaggerated campaign expenses for candidates of the 2010 elections to select educational chiefs in Gwangju and South Jeolla Province and two other local elections held the same year and the following year in its reports to the election management authorities, to obtain subsidies, according to prosecutors.
Charges against the 50-year-old lawmaker include embezzlement of around 200 million won of CN Communications' corporate funds through accounting fraud, prosecutors said. Lee then allegedly laundered the money by buying a building in Seoul's main financial district of Yeouido through auction.
Lee and another UPP lawmaker Kim Jae-yeon have long been accused of unfairly winning their proportional representation tickets for April's parliamentary elections in a primary widely believed to have been rigged. The two lawmakers, who allegedly espouse the North's guiding "juche" philosophy of self-reliance, have been under pressure to quit their party over the alleged primary fraud. (Yonhap)