Tag: Park Geun-hye

South Korean reporters wait for officials from government and private companies to be summoned to the Seoul Central District Prosecutors’ Office in southern Seoul on Oct. 30, 2016, as the investigators said they will call in a number of figures related to the Choi Soon-sil scandal. The longtime confidante of President Park Geun-hye is suspected of peddling influence and interfering in state affairs. Choi returned to South Korea on the same day, after nearly two months of hiding in Europe. (Yonhap)

President Park’s long-time friend, Choi Soon-shil who is at the center of the current political influence scandal in South Korea has spoken out about the issue from a hotel in Germany:

Choi, who has known the president for some 40 years, is the fifth daughter of Park’s late mentor Choi Tae-min, a leader of a questionable religious group who died in 1994. Observers said Park developed a friendship with the Choi family after her mother and then-first lady Yook Young-soo was assassinated in 1974.

The South Korean public has been casting watchful eyes on the scandal, with some even claiming that the case may have a religious connection, although Prime Minister Hwang Kyo-ahn ruled out such assumptions. Choi’s father reportedly founded a religion in the 1970s that combined Buddhist, Christian and indigenous faith practices.

“Choi is ready to receive punishment if investigations reveal any lawbreaking activities,” he said, adding Choi has no intention to flee or hide.

She, however, asked for “mercy” concerning her daughter through the lawyer. She earlier said in the interview that she traveled overseas to “protect” the daughter, who is also embroiled in controversy on speculations that she was unfairly accepted to Seoul-based Ewha Womans University. Some of the university’s students argued that Choi’s daughter received relatively higher grades compared to her actual achievements.

The emotionally appealing remark by Choi’s legal representatives came amid mounting anger among the South Korean public.

Reflecting the sentiment, local pollster Gallup Korea said Friday that Park’s approval rating was at 17 percent from Tuesday to Thursday this week, marking an 8 percentage point drop from a seven-day period earlier. It marks the lowest rating since she took office and a decrease for the sixth consecutive week.

A whopping 74 percent of the respondents were negative about Park’s achievements in state affairs, soaring 10 percentage points on-week.  [Yonhap]

You can read the rest at the link, but it looks like President Park is continuing the trend of South Korean presidents entering office with high approval ratings and then leaving office with incredibly low ratings.

South Koreans Call for President’s Impeachment Over Influence Scandal https://t.co/0IOMI6jClk pic.twitter.com/wGqe8ddm8M

— The Diplomat (@Diplomat_APAC) October 28, 2016

President Park may have her own Hillary Clinton like email scandal on her hands if in fact she was sending secret information over unsecure email to her friend to review to help prepare Presidential speeches.   President Park’s non-profit group just like the Clinton Foundation is also accused of strong arming corporations for money:

The broadcaster said it obtained the computer by searching through things discarded from Choi’s office after she left the country in the wake of a series of corruption and power abuse allegations. Choi is accused of creating nonprofit foundations to benefit President Park after she leaves office, strong-arming conglomerates to make massive donations to them and personally siphoning off money from them.

Choi is a daughter of Park’s former mentor, the late Choi Tae-min. Following JTBC’s Monday report on her editing of the president’s speeches, Park admitted Tuesday that she sought help from her longtime friend to write speeches and public addresses and issued a public apology. Choi, however, seems to have exerted much more power over the president than ever conceived of before – possibly to an unprecedented extent.

According to the JBTC’s Monday report, a file entitled “Blue House meeting” was saved at 4:56 a.m. on Dec. 28, 2012. The eight-page document laid out a scenario for Park, who was then the president-elect, ahead of her meeting to President Lee Myung-bak. The meeting took place 10 hours later.

In a section of the file marked “Foreign affairs and national security issues,” Park was directed to ask Lee a question: “In order to prevent the North’s additional provocations, I believe inter-Korean dialogue is necessary in addition to international cooperation. What contacts have made between the two Koreas?”

Underneath the question, a line read: “The military had three secret contacts with the North’s National Defense Commission recently.”

Talks between Seoul and Pyongyang formally ceased after the North’s sinking of the warship Cheonan in April 2010. It was confidential information that the South Korean military and the North Korean National Defense Commission had secret contacts in 2012. The document suggests that Choi had access to a national security secret.  [Joong Ang Ilbo]

You can read more at the link.

This seems to be much to do about nothing and simply partisan politics:

President Park Geun-hye on Tuesday apologized to the nation over a leak of dozens of presidential speeches to an acqaintance who has been at the center of an escalating corruption scandal that has roiled politics over the past month.

“Regardless of the reasons involved, I am sorry that (the scandal) has caused national concerns,” she said. “I deeply apologize to the people.”

Park’s apology came a day after local broadcaster JTBC revealed that Choi Soon-sil had received dozens of presidential speeches, including Park’s election campaign remarks, before they were delivered by the president.

The broadcaster said it found the speeches from about 200 files obtained from a computer that was left to be thrown away in Choi’s office in southern Seoul. Among the speeches was Park’s so-called Dresden address on reunification delivered in Germany in March 2014.

The president acknowledged that Choi had helped her prepare for public speeches during her presidential election campaign and the early part of her presidency.

“During the last presidential election campaign, she (Choi) has offered me personal comments about my campaign activities, mostly speeches and publicity efforts,” Park said.

“For some period of time after my inauguration, I had asked for her opinion over some materials, but after the secretarial staff at Cheong Wa Dae was fully established, I stopped (asking for her help).”  [Yonhap]

You can read the rest at the link, but Park’s political opposition wants her cabinet ministers who gave Choi the speeches to resign and possibly face prosecution.  According to the legal experts quoted in the article the speeches were drafts and thus not official Presidential correspondence thus no legal ramifications.

I wonder if in the US there are any legal ramifications for giving the text of a Presidential speech to someone to look at before it is given?

Personally I kind of like the Korean Presidential system to where it cycles out leaders quicker.  I think leadership changes are a good thing that brings renewed energy and ideas to the Presidency:

South Korean President Park Geun Hye on Monday (Oct 24) called for constitutional reform that could allow future presidents to serve two terms – a sensitive issue for a country tainted by memories of long-term, autocratic rule.

While its Constitution grants enormous power to the executive, South Korea is one of the only economically advanced liberal democracies to restrict the presidency to a single five-year term, with no possibility of re-election.

The limit was set back in 1987 as South Korea transitioned to democracy after decades of military rule, and sought to preempt any return to extended periods of authoritarian control.  [The Strait Times via a reader tip]

You can read the rest at the link, but President Park says that the Constitutional change would not apply to her presidency.  This is definitely a wise move because if she tried to run for reelection the Korean left would be claiming she is trying to begin a dictatorship just like her father Park Chung-hee.  Speaking of dictatorships has there even ever been one in modern times led by a female?

South Korean President Park Geun-hye delivers an opening speech at the Global Saemaul Leadership Forum in Pyeongchang, 180 kilometers east of Seoul, on Oct. 18, 2016. The Saemaul Movement, started by incumbent President Park Geun-hye’s father, late President Park Chung-hee, in the 1970s, aimed at national development and has since been shared with other countries as a development model. (Yonhap)

President Park has double down on her policy of encouraging the mass defections of North Korean refugees which the Kim regime has responded to by calling her a “impudent bitch”:

South Korean President Park Geun-Hye on Tuesday told her government to prepare for large-scale defections from North Korea, just days after direct appealing to its citizens to flee their country.

A recent spate of high-profile North Korean defections have provided a propaganda windfall for Seoul, which has spun them into a narrative of a Pyongyang leadership in crisis and riven with descent.

Notable defections have included the North’s deputy ambassador to Britain and a rare, group escape by a dozen waitresses from a North Korean-run restaurant in China.

In an address to mark Armed Forced Day earlier this month, Park had vowed to “keep the road open” for future escapees and urged North Koreans to “come to the bosom of freedom in the South.”

Pyongyang’s response was to call Park a “bare-faced and impudent bitch” in a commentary carried by the ruling party newspaper, Rodong Sinmun.

Speaking at a cabinet meeting on Tuesday, Park reiterated her defection appeal, and stressed the importance of preparing the ground for any new arrivals.

“Defectors are like unification that has arrived early, and a test bed for unification,” Park said.

“I hope we can swiftly secure sufficient system and capacity to accommodate North Korean citizens who come seeking freedom,” she added.  [AFP]

You can read more at the link.

President Park Geun-hye is getting some love from Elle magazine:

Before becoming South Korea’s first-ever female president in 2013, Park Geun-hye acted as the chairwoman of the Conservative Grand National Party and as a member of the Korean National Assembly. Geun-hye, whose father served as president for nearly two decades, is often called one of the most powerful women in the world. During her time in office, she has worked to prioritize national security, particularly in relationship to North Korea, and to revitalize the South Korean economy, which is the 14th largest in the world.  [Elle]

You can see the rest of the list at the link.

It is great to finally see a South Korean leader openly advocate for North Korean citizens to stand up to the Kim Jong-un regime by voting with their feet:

President Park Geun-hye issued a blunt message to urge North Korean soldiers and citizens to defect to the South, inviting criticisms from liberal politicians over her provocativeness while fueling speculations about conditions in the reclusive communist regime.

Park made the comment in a speech at a ceremony to mark Armed Forces Day on Saturday. In the speech, she addressed the latest security crisis caused by the Kim Jong-un regime’s nuclear and missile development and the South’s determination to counter it.

Park made perhaps the most provocative proposal by far to North Koreans. “Today, I want to clearly tell the reality that the North Korean regime is facing to the North Korean authorities, military and people,” she said, stressing that it is a misunderstanding and miscalculation of the young North Korean ruler to expect to achieve security and internal unity by demonstrating its nuclear and missile capabilities and escalating military tensions.

She noted that the international community is reacting differently from the past to the North’s provocations and the North is facing strengthened pressures and sanctions, while the negotiation stage has ended.

She, then, directly addressed the North Korean people. “We know the brutal reality that you are facing now. The international community is also seriously concerned about the North Korean regime’s human rights abuses.”

Promising that the South will do its best to end the North’s provocations and inhumane rule, Park said, “We will leave the path open for the North Korean people to find hope and life. Come to the free land of the Republic of Korea at any time.”  [Joong Ang Ilbo]

You can read more at the link.