Choo Mi-ae nominated as justice minister
Choo Mi-ae speaks to reporters after being nominated for the post of justice minister at National Assembly in Seoul, Thursday. Yonhap
Rep. Choo Mi-ae, a five-term lawmaker of the ruling Democratic Party, has been nominated for the post of justice minister, which was recently vacated by the resignation of scandal-ridden Cho Kuk.
Choo started her career as a politician by winning the 1996 general elections under the ticket of the then-opposition National Congress for New Politics after serving as a district court justice for 12 years.
Her change of career was made in protest of government pressure to judge pro-democracy activists under the authoritarian rule of President Chun Doo-whan.
As a legislator, Choo rose to prominence for drawing public attention for the first time to the 1948 Jeju Uprising, a decades-long taboo subject in South Korean society, by attending a memorial service in 1998 for the victims of the incident. The following year, Choo chaired the first-ever public probe into the incident sparked by the South Korean Communist Party. Brutal police and military crackdowns during the uprising are estimated to have killed or injured tens of thousands of innocent residents on Jeju Island.
She led the Democratic Party from 2016 till 2018.
She earned the nickname "Choo d'Arc" for her determined style, especially in managing her party's election campaign in 2004
Born in the southern city of Daegu in 1958, Choo graduated from Hanyang University's law school and started her career as a justice at the Chuncheon District Court in 1985, becoming the country's first female legislator to have served as a judge. (Yonhap)