Justice minister nominee savages DP's reform bill

Politics

Published: 14 Apr. 2022, 18:24 Updated: 14 Apr. 2022, 18:55

Justice minister nominee savages DP's reform bill

Han Dong-hoon, President-elect Yoon Suk-yeol's justice minister nominee, attends a press conference at the transition team's headquarters in Jongno District, central Seoul, where Yoon announced his nomination on Wednesday. [YONHAP]

A former prosecutor nominated by President-elect Yoon Suk-yeol to be justice minister says a ruling Democratic Party (DP) bill to strip the state prosecution service of its remaining investigative powers must be stopped.

Han Dong-hoon, the vice president of the Judicial Research and Training Institute and Yoon's closest ally during the president-elect’s time as prosecutor general, was announced as Yoon's pick to head the Justice Ministry on Wednesday.

When questioned on Wednesday by reporters about the DP’s determination to pass a prosecution reform bill, Han said it must not become law.

“One can see the entire country is opposed to the bill, except for the DP,” Han said. “People from all walks of life – lawyers, legal experts, civic group activists – all of them are against it.”

Han added that “it is apparent that the people will suffer the most once the bill gets the nod from the National Assembly,” and said the bill “must be stopped.”

Yoon’s nomination of a prosecutor for the post of justice minister promises much closer relations between the ministry and the state prosecution after years of adversarial relations under the administration of outgoing President Moon Jae-in, whose own justice ministers attempted to defang the prosecution.

Although Moon appointed Yoon to the post of prosecutor general in 2019, relations between prosecution and administration soured after the powerful law enforcement agency launched several probes into key figures close to the president.

One investigation greenlighted by Yoon torpedoed the political career of liberal icon Cho Kuk, Moon’s presidential secretary for civil affairs who served as justice minister for less than a month before escalating allegations of academic fraud by his daughter forced his resignation.

While weakening powerful state agencies was an early agenda of Moon’s administration and the ruling DP, the determination to weaken prosecutors became especially prominent after that episode.

At the end of 2020, the DP rammed through a bill to establish the Corruption Investigation Office for High-ranking Officials (CIO) and give more power to the National Police Agency, limiting the scope of investigations conducted by prosecutors.

In late 2020, Justice Minister Choo Mi-ae attempted to bring the prosecution service to heel by suspending Yoon from his post for undermining prosecutors’ political neutrality and non-compliance with an audit — an order that was later overturned by an administrative court.

Han, who was the youngest prosecutor to be promoted to a district attorney-level position under Yoon, was taken off corruption probes and demoted several times as the Justice Ministry attempted to bring the prosecution service in line.

It was predicted Han would be given a key position in the incoming Yoon administration, with the president-elect commending him for his resistance to external pressure on the campaign trail.

“He worked under a lot of political pressure from the government when he probed corruption scandals involving politicians, but he didn't back down,” Yoon said in a February interview.

“He saw his role as a prosecutor as akin to that of an independence fighter,” Yoon said.

The prosecution reform bill proposed by the DP, which its lawmakers at a plenary session on Tuesday agreed to push through the National Assembly, would bring about the complete abolition of the prosecution’s remaining investigative powers.

DP Chairman Yun Ho-jung said the party aimed to use its super-majority of 172 seats in the 300-member National Assembly to pass the bill and have it promulgated into law at a Cabinet meeting scheduled for May 3, before the presidency is handed over to Yoon.

The bill is the same as one Yoon criticized when he announced his resignation as prosecutor general in March 2021.

The current prosecutor general, Kim Oh-soo, has vowed to fight the bill with all available measures.

BY MICHAEL LEE [lee.junhyuk@joongang.co.kr]