Party Denies Tactic To Manipulate Press

A tentative presidential campaign plan for opposition Leader Lee Hoi-chang is stirring controversy with its proposed strategies to control the press.

The Daily Naeil carried in its Tuesday edition an eight-page document which included a plan to mobilize pro-Lee journalists while digging up dirt on anti-Lee reporters.

Representative Maeng Hyung-kyu of the party's planning committee denied that the party produced the document.

"The papers have no correlation to our party platform," he said. "I have never seen the papers (before) nor have I submitted them to party leader Lee Hoi-chang."

Mr. Lee, speaking in Taegu, North Kyongsang Province, deplored the disclosure of what he dismissed as a independent proposal written by one individual that did not reflect the party's position.

"We are a political party, not a faction," Mr. Lee said. "It damages our reputation and our platform when the ideas of one out of hundreds of employees of the party secretariat are publicly disclosed."

Included among the 10 controversial points are plans to collect records of personal corruption by core ruling party members and collecting material on possible contenders in the 2002 presidential election.

by Chun Young-gi