[EDITORIALS]Tumult and suspicions

The prosecution yesterday summoned Song Du-yul, a Korean-German sociologist, and started investigation on his past activities. While allegations and doubts about him will be investigated by the prosecution, the people’s attention is on how the government intervened in Mr. Song’s visit here. If it does not clear up these suspicions, people will not trust the prosecution’s investigation result.
First, we want to know how Mr. Song could be invited by a government agency despite the National Intelligence Service’s evidence about his past activities. And what was the motive behind his decision to return home? When the justice minister said, “It is difficult to punish him, even if he is Kim Chul-su,” people suspected that the government had promised to give him an indulgence after its investigation.
Park Hyeong-gyu, head of the government agency set up to honor democracy fighters, said there was “bona fide cooperation among government agencies” on Mr. Song’s visit. We want to know also just what he meant. And we want to know what Mr. Song meant when he said, “There is a deep discussion about me at the Blue House.”
Amid such questions, speculation is also now focusing on the visit by a deputy director of the National Intelligence Service to Berlin a week before Mr. Song’s visit. The man is a classmate and friend of Mr. Song.
Even visitors at Blue House functions are screened by the intelligence agency in advance, so it is incomprehensible how Mr. Song could have been cleared to be a participant in these honors for democrats. The director of the intelligence agency concealed from the National Assembly the fact that the agency had attached an opinion that it preferred to suspend the prosecution of Mr. Song when it sent his case to the prosecution. That also raises suspicions.
Korea is in a difficult situation domestically and abroad. Divisions among the people after the presidential election are not yet healed, and another emotionally charged confrontation is the last thing we need.
The Blue House owes us some explanations, and they should come quickly.