Powers that be come down hard on dissenting police chiefs

Politics

Published: 24 Jul. 2022, 18:12

Powers that be come down hard on dissenting police chiefs

Ryu Sam-yeong, chief of the Ulsan Jungbu Police Precinct, responds to reporters' questions following a meeting of police officials at the Police Human Resources Training Institute in Asan, South Chungcheong. [NEWS1]

The National Police Agency (NPA) said Saturday that it would punish people who participated in a weekend conference at which high-ranking police officers declared their opposition to the creation of a police oversight bureau under the Interior Ministry.

Ryu Sam-yeong, chief of the Ulsan Jungbu Police Precinct, has already been discharged from his post for attending and is awaiting reassignment to a lower position in his precinct.

Ryu released a statement Saturday arguing he legally attended the meeting using his vacation leave.

"There is no issue with [us] gathering to discuss a grave matter concerning the future of the police," he said.

Fifty police precinct chiefs attended the conference at the Police Human Resources Training Institute in Asan, South Chungcheong on Saturday, while another 140 attended virtually.

The officials issued a statement after the four-hour conference calling on the Interior Ministry to shelve its plan to establish a bureau to oversee the police agency until more public and legislative consultations take place.

In the statement, the conference’s participants cited the risk that the ministry’s bureau could undermine the police agency’s political neutrality and independence.

“Many police precinct chiefs shared and expressed their concern that control over the NPA commissioner general by the interior minister would damage the rule of law,” the statement said.

The Interior Ministry has said that greater oversight of the NPA is necessary once the agency takes over most of the state prosecution service’s investigative powers in September.

Through its so-called “police bureau,” the Interior Ministry will be able to take on a wide range of functions such as recommending candidates for high-ranking police positions and demanding disciplinary measures for senior police officials, including the commissioner general.

Police at Saturday’s conference called it a reversal of 1991 reforms that made the police agency independent of the Ministry of Home Affairs, the precursor of the Interior Ministry.

“While participants do agree with the idea of democratic control [of the police agency] grounded in the principle of checks and balances, they also concurred that the establishment of a police bureau, and administrative control by means of such a new command structure, would constitute a historic backsliding,” the statement said.

News of Ryu’s discharge appeared to trigger a backlash, with comments over the weekend on the agency’s internal communications portal revealing the depth of opposition to the police bureau among police.

“We denounce the idea of a police bureau that acts according to the whims of the government in power,” wrote one commentator.

The author of another post took aim at Yoon Hee-geun, the current NPA deputy commissioner general and Interior Minister Lee Sang-min’s choice to head the agency, for failing to defend police independence.

“We do not want a commissioner general who only looks to the interior minister and the president for instructions,” the post read.

A Seoul police precinct chief who spoke to Yonhap on condition of anonymity said the agency’s punitive measures against participants in Saturday’s conference showed its determination to bring officials to heel.

“Ryu’s reassignment is just one way in which the police organization is being reduced to a subordinate role under this presidential administration,” he said.

The official also highlighted discrepancies between the government’s treatment of dissenting police officials and prosecutors who opposed the weakening of the state prosecution service.

“Didn’t then-justice minister nominee Han Dong-hoon say in May that one has a duty to speak up if an unjust law is being passed?” the official said.

Prior to his appointment as justice minister, Han was a prominent prosecutor.

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