By Lee Kyung-min
The prosecution is striking back against President Park Geun-hye who has been refusing to comply with its investigation of the scandal involving her confidant Choi Soon-sil. It has requested Park to accept face-to-face questioning by next Tuesday.
While the President has been refusing the prosecution’s call for questioning since Sunday, prosecutors are increasing their pressure on her gradually.
As part of their drive, prosecutors raided a unit of Cheong Wa Dae’s civil affairs division Wednesday to look into whether Woo Byung-woo, former senior presidential secretary for civil affairs, overlooked Choi’s corruption or was involved in it.
Announcing its interim investigation results on the scandal, the prosecution cited President Park as a suspect and an accomplice of alleged corruption committed by Choi and her two former aides — An Chong-bum and Jeong Ho-seong.
Prosecutors said they are more than certain they will prove 99 percent of what’s written in the indictment documents of the three because they secured crucial evidence from An and Jeong.
Citing a conversation between President Park and Jeong recorded on Jeong’s phone, the prosecution said the powerful evidence would corner the President and aggravate public anger toward her.
“We have secured recordings in which President Park ordered Jeong on how to help Choi in specific detail,” a prosecutor told SBS, a local broadcaster, Tuesday. “If we release only 10 seconds of the whole recording to the public, the candles of the weekend protests may be replaced by torches.”
An’s notes are also key evidence, the prosecutor added.
“The notes contains Park’s remarks in great detail. We thought it could be used as the annals of history.”
The prosecutor also compared the indictment documents to mere “fat-free meat,” adding he could add footnotes on each sentence with further evidence and testimonies from fully identified sources.
The prosecution indicated that it may disclose the evidence if Park insists on refusing its questioning request.
“We demand the President come for face-to face questioning, or we could release evidence to the public before we hand it over to the independent counsel that will take over the investigation,” the prosecutor said.
Prosecutors said they want to conduct the questioning by Tuesday, saying they did not specify the location of the questioning.
Earlier on Sunday, Cheong Wa Dae and Park’s legal representative said Park will not cooperate with the prosecution investigation, which they claim is “politically biased,” and will prepare for a “neutral” independent counsel-led investigation.
Presidential spokesperson Jung Youn-kuk dismissed the prosecution’s accusation of Park, saying the investigation results are like a house of cards, made up of false facts, a stance echoed by the President’s defense attorney Yoo Young-ha.
Similarly on Tuesday, Lee Kyung-jae, a legal representative of Choi and her daughter Chung Yoo-ra, said what’s written in the prosecution’s indictment documents is a fiction purely based on imagination, not facts, adding that no hard evidence was presented other than the statements by those questioned.
The prosecution raided the unit of the presidential civil affairs division over the allegation that Woo knowingly failed to oversee numerous irregularities alleged committed by Choi.
Investigators confiscated computer hard disks, documents and mobile phones of related officials at an office of the division located outside Cheong Wa Dae. Woo’s job was to monitor corruption in presidential aides and high-profile government officials. It is suspected Woo was aware of Choi’s corruptive activities or even cooperated with her.