Former ROK President Lee Myung-bak To Be Questioned Over Corruption Allegations

The campaign to put former President Lee Myung-Bak in jail next to Park Geun-hye continues:

The prosecution will question former President Lee Myung-bak next Wednesday over a wide range of wrongdoings allegedly sanctioned under his administration. The Seoul Central District Prosecutors’ Office said it asked Lee to appear before the district office at 9:30 a.m. March 14.

The summons came amid intensifying investigation into members of Lee’s family and close aides, and their incriminating statements. Lee is facing abuse of power charges for managing hundreds of billions of won (hundreds of millions of dollars) in a slush fund through DAS, a car parts manufacturer ostensibly owned by his elder brother Lee Sang-eun. A key aide managing his assets said Lee owned land in Dogok, southern Seoul, under a borrowed name and the proceeds from the sale of the land were funneled into DAS, substantiating the prosecution’s supposition that Lee Myung-bak was the company owner.

The controversy concerning DAS nearly cost him his 2007 Presidential election as it was among the few entities that recovered its initial investment in full during his term unlike 5,500 investors who lost 100 billion won in a stock price manipulation scandal in 2001.

Lee is suspected of receiving 1.7 billion won in bribes from the National Intelligence Service through many of his key aides who recently confessed about their roles in delivering the money. Lee is also suspected of having Samsung Group pay about 6 billion won in a retainer to a U.S. firm, Akin Gump, of which Samsung was a major client in return for a presidential pardon for group chairman Lee Kun-hee in 2009.  [Korea Times]

You can read more at the link, but as I have long said this is all payback by the South Korean left against Lee Myung-Bak for exposing the corruption of former leftwing President Roh Moo-hyun.  The exposing of the corruption led Roh to commit suicide.