Spy agency under Lee attempted to degrade liberal ex-presidents
By Kim Rahn
Roh Moo-hyun
The nation’s spy agency under the former Lee Myung-bak administration attempted to denigrate two previous liberal presidents by encouraging conservative civic groups to campaign against them, the prosecution said Monday.
According to the prosecution and the National Intelligence Service’s (NIS) internal fact-finding panel, the agency’s psychological warfare unit urged two conservative civic groups to issue comments criticizing former President Roh Moo-hyun and the then opposition Millennium Democratic Party (MDP) in April 2009.
It was when the prosecution was summoning Roh’s family members for questioning over the allegation that Taekwang CEO Park Yeon-cha offered bribes to Roh’s family in exchange for business favors.
When Roh’s son was called in on April 12 that year, the National Federation of the New Right made a comment to demand the MDP apologize to the people for producing a “bad president named Roh Moo-hyun.”
“The MDP produced a bad president who was incompetent, corrupt and cheap, making people suffer for the last five years. Now it shames people with the corruption scandal,” it said.
On April 10, a day before Roh’s wife Kwon Yang-sook was summoned, another civic group said in a comment: “Roh himself demanded money from Park _ it is even disgusting to call him a former president of Korea.”
The prosecution and the NIS panel said they secured emails exchanged between the NIS and the civic groups to discuss what comments to issue.
Roh, who was summoned on April 30, killed himself on May 23.
Kim Dae-jung
For Roh’s predecessor Kim Dae-jung, the spy agency made plans to have his Nobel Peace Prize revoked, the prosecution said after seizing emails exchanged between a staffer at the NIS unit and another conservative civic group head.
The two people talked about the group sending a petition to the Norwegian Nobel Committee to have Kim’s award revoked after Kim passed away in August 2009. Kim received the award in 2000 for his dedication to democracy, human rights and reconciliation with North Korea.
The group received funds from the NIS during the Lee administration and placed ads to support government policies or criticize opposition politicians, according to the prosecution. It also made comments right after Kim’s death that he took advantage of regionalism for political purposes and damaged South Korea’s identity through the June 15 joint statement with the North.
Regarding the allegation, Kim’s youngest son, Hong-gul, said he never imagined such an attempt had been made.
“When my father died in 2009, the Lee administration, which had been surprised at the public commemorating the memory of former President Roh in May that year, tried to avoid a repeat of the commemoration,” he said in a Facebook post.
“I never imagined they would have made such a conniving attempt regarding the Nobel prize as well. But I guess that was not impossible considering they also made political attacks when my father received the prize.”
Kim Hyun, a spokeswoman of the ruling Democratic Party of Korea, said in a press release, “Lee should regret his wrongdoing and apologize to people. The petition attempt to revoke Kim’s Nobel prize, made by the NIS under the Lee administration, is political retaliation.”
Lee Haeng-ja, a spokeswoman of the minor opposition People’s Party, also said, “If the attempt is true, it is a huge incident that trampled on the nation’s reputation. If former President Lee was involved, he should not be exempted from the investigation.”