Letters requested invite to North for Lee Jae-myung

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Letters requested invite to North for Lee Jae-myung

Democratic Party Chairman Lee Jae-myung, left, with Ri Jong-hyok, North Korea’s Asia-Pacific Peace Committee while attending Asia-Pacific Exchange Association’s convention held at MVL Hotel in Goyang, Gyeonggi in 2018 , when Lee was Gyeonggi governor. [GYEONGGI PROVINCIAL GOVERNMENT]

Democratic Party Chairman Lee Jae-myung, left, with Ri Jong-hyok, North Korea’s Asia-Pacific Peace Committee while attending Asia-Pacific Exchange Association’s convention held at MVL Hotel in Goyang, Gyeonggi in 2018 , when Lee was Gyeonggi governor. [GYEONGGI PROVINCIAL GOVERNMENT]

 
The JoongAng Ilbo has secured documents written by the Gyeonggi government in 2019 asking North Korea to invite then-governor Lee Jae-myung for a visit.
 
The documents are currently being investigated by the Suwon District Prosecutors’ Office.  
 
The JoongAng Ilbo has secured the first and final drafts of a letter sent to North Korea in Lee's name, as well as a follow-up letter officially requesting a visit by a delegation headed by the governor.  
 
The letter is addressed to Kim Yong-chul, a North Korean general and right-hand man of leader Kim Jong-un.
 
The general is considered the mastermind behind several attacks on South Korea, including the sinking of the South Korean warship Cheonan in 2010 and the shelling of South Korea's Yeonpyeong Island the same year.
 
Kim was the head of Pyongyang’s state-controlled Asia-Pacific Peace Committee at the time.  
 
Gyeonggi government's letter requesting then governor Lee Jae-myung official invitation to North Korea. [JOONGANG ILBO]

Gyeonggi government's letter requesting then governor Lee Jae-myung official invitation to North Korea. [JOONGANG ILBO]

According to the JoongAng Ilbo, the first draft of the two-page letter from Gyeonggi government, which has the stamp of its governor, described how the Gyeonggi provincial government was working on expanding cooperative projects with North Korea.  
 
The letter pointed to a humanitarian food program, as well as a tree planting project with North Korea in May 2019.  
 
“We humbly request that North Korea invites me, the Gyeonggi province governor, and a Gyeonggi province delegation" to promote balanced economic development on the Korean Peninsula and common prosperity, the letter states.  
 
“I express my respect to the committee chairman for his devotion to the peace and prosperity of our nation,” the letter added, referring to Kim.
 
The final version that was delivered to North Korea in the same month, however, deleted the phrase that requested the invite.  
 
Instead, it included a statement that request cooperation on additional projects, including the joint hosting of celebration marking the first anniversary of the April 27 “Panmunjom Declaration on Peace, Prosperity and Reunification,” between then-President Moon Jae-in and North Korea’s Kim Jong-un.
 
One figure who was involved in North Korea-related products pushed by Gyeonggi's provincial government and underwear company SWB, told the JoongAng Ilbo that he believed Ahn Bu-soo, the chairman of South Korea's Asia-Pacific Exchange Association and "the middleman between Gyeonggi government, SBW and North Korea," passed the letter to Song Myong-chol of North Korea’s Asia-Pacific Peace Committee in Shenyang, China. 
 
Another official letter six months later added the invitation request.  

 
The letter proposes broadscale cooperation in pork production, as well as steamrolling the modernization of North Korean farms through smart technologies, noting that the North Korean committee agreed with the initiatives in October 2018.  
 
Lee, now chairman of the Democratic Party, is accused of sending large sums of dollars to North Korea through SBW, as well as several luxury items including a Hermes horse saddle, suspected to be a gift to North Korean leader Kim Jong-un.  
 
Kim Seong-tae, former SBW chairman, reportedly told prosecutors that he had paid North Korean officials a total of $8 million, of which $3 million was a payment for Lee’s visit to Pyongyang and tranferred in November 2019, coinciding with when the follow-up letter requesting an official invite was delivered.  
 
The remaining $5 million is suspected of having been a payment for Gyeonggi’s smart farm project in North Korea.  
 
Kim allegedly told investigators that he talked to Lee through a phone call arranged by then Gyeonggi deputy governor Lee Hwa-young, who has been arrested for taking bribes from SBW, while meeting a North Korean official in China.  
 
Kim allegedly said that Lee Jae-myung thanked hm.  
 
The DP chairman has rejected the accusations as absurd fabrications by prosecutors.  
 
Lee has repeatedly denied even knowing SBW former chairman Kim, adding that the only relationship he has with the underwear company is that he wears its thermal underwear.
 
However, after Kim was extradited from Thailand on Jan. 17 after eight months on the lam, Lee appeared on broadcaster KBS the next day and said he had been told that he had once talked on the phone with Kim, though he continued to deny having met him in person.  
 
“But I don’t remember as I was told that the phone was passed on to me when I was drinking with someone,” Lee said.  
 
In 2018 and 2019, Gyeonggi's provincial government was increasing its exchanges with North Korea, including Lee's welcoming speech at the South Korean Asia-Pacific Exchange Association’s convention held at Goyang,Gyeonggi in November with North Korean officials in attendance.
 
Deputy Governor Lee Hwa-young also met North Korean officials during the same association’s convention held in Manila in July 2019.  
 
When then-President Moon Jae-in visited Pyongyang in September 2018, his entourage included then-Seoul mayor Park Won-soon and Gangwon province governor Choi Moon-soon, also prominent figures in the DP.  
 
However, the entourage did not include Lee.  
 
The People Power Party has argued that if all the allegations against Lee turn out to be true, the DP chairman would not only have violated United Nation Security Council sanctions against North Korea, but he could also face the death penalty for treason.  
 
Lee in late 2021 and early 2022 became the Democratic Party’s presidential candidate. He later won a seat in the National Assembly after winning a by-election held three months after losing the presidential race. In August, he became the head of the DP, which holds the majority of seats at the National Assembly.  
 
In addition to the SBW and North Korea investigation, Lee is implicated in several other cases prosecutors are looking into, including a land development profiteering scandal and allegations regarding corporate sponsorship of Seongnam city's football club, all allegedly committed while he was serving as Seongnam's city mayor.  
 
Lee was summoned twice by prosecutors last month alone.

BY HEO JEONG-WON, LEE HO-JEONG [lee.hojeong@joongang.co.kr]
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