&#91EDITORIALS&#93Covering up a horror

Police have found that officials with the Daegu Metropolitan Subway Corp. attempted to avoid their responsibilities in connection with the subway tragedy in Daegu last week by omitting a portion of the voice records of communication between the subway’s control center and the driver of the second train gutted in the blaze. Police say that when the subway corporation submitted the transcript of the records to police, it failed to include a part in which a train operator tells the conductor to “cut the power supply to the train and flee.”
We believe that subway officials tried to cover up some of their mistakes and hide evidence of their bungled response to the disaster to avoid or minimize their responsibilities. Considering the low level of ethical standards and professionalism of subway officials, it is no wonder that they failed to prevent an arson case from becoming one of the most devastating disasters in the country.
Police have found that the conductor of the second train, in which most of the victims were trapped, contacted eight subway officials for 11 hours after he had fled without opening the train doors, leaving many passengers to die horrible deaths in a hideous inferno. The transcript was made by the subway company’s internal inspection bureau, according to the police. Therefore, senior Daegu subway officials must have been aware of the true content of the tapes. That is why the subway company is suspected of having made an organized attempt to cover up or manipulate evidence.
According to the records omitted by the subway firm, train operators repeatedly told the conductor to turn off the train’s engine and power, but never mentioned the safety of the passengers. Police say that they are investigating whether the subway corporation also manipulated the closed-circuit television tapes of the incident recorded by a camera in the station. We also suspect this is why the subway company hurried to clean up the site of the fire even before forensic experts finish recovering the remain of the victims. It would be a shameless crime to rig or destroy evidence in order not to be held responsible.