How to neutralize the top spy agency

Jang Seok-kwang
The author is the general secretary of the Academy of National Intelligence.

On Dec. 13, 2020, the National Assembly, led by the overwhelming majority of the Democratic Party (DP), passed massive amendments on the National Intelligence Service (NIS) Act. At the time, 187 lawmakers attended the voting and all 187 voted in favor. With the amendments, the spy agency’s power to investigate suspected espionage — a 60-year-long tradition since the organization was established on June 10, 1961 — was abolished. In the past, espionage investigations were handled by the NIS and the police, but now the police are solely in charge of it.

The NIS’s investigative power was abolished because of criticisms that it had long infringed upon human rights, but a three-year grace period was given to ensure the police’s smooth takeover of the authority and avoid an investigation vacuum. The grace period allowed the NIS to continue espionage investigations until the end of December 2023 even after the amendments.

In January 2021, the National Office of Investigation was established under the National Police Agency and four regulations governing the police were revised. But no clauses in the Criminal Procedure Act, the Rules of Investigation, the Rules of Police Investigation and the Rules of Criminal Investigation were revised to help the police exclusively handle espionage cases. The DP and the police failed to fulfill their obligations to come up with complementary measures during the three-year grace period. The police’s capability to investigate suspected espionage has actually been weakened. After the NIS’s investigate power finally ended in January, the country’s capability to investigate suspected espionage was effectively cut in half.

“Of the national security police, 70 percent have no experience in espionage investigation and 80 percent of team leaders have never conducted an espionage investigation,” a national security police lamented in a recent interview with a monthly magazine. The interview was conducted six months after the police became the sole operator of espionage investigations. “Members of the newly recruited security police will run away around January next year. We are heading to mutual destruction, rather than destroying Communists. We don’t see national security,” he said.

While the police in charge of national security investigations expressed their frustration, the opposition DP — a majority party in the National Assembly — submitted a bill to abolish the NIS’s authority to inquire into suspected espionage. In December 2020, when the NIS’s power to investigate was abolished, the majority party cited the agency’s past human rights violations as the main reason for stripping the spy agency of its rights to inquire into suspected espionage. The DP said the right to inquiry could violate human rights more broadly than the power to investigate. Though it is not illegal to submit a bill, the DP’s argument does not make sense.

In the 21st National Assembly, the DP controls the overwhelming majority of the National Assembly by occupying 170 seats. As soon as the legislature opened, the DP has organized and operated reckless legislative and political campaigns. It is pushing for a presidential impeachment, dismantlement of the prosecution and a complete abolishment of the power of the Board of Audit and Inspection.

If the NIS is stripped of its right to make inquiries, it will be impossible for the NIS to even verify any intelligence on possible espionage. Information-sharing between the NIS and the police will become even more difficult, and the national security police, which has no track record, will face criticisms for their uselessness. The National Security Act will naturally become powerless.

In February 1964, the North Korean regime presented its plan to reinforce three revolutionary capabilities. Since then, Pyongyang has tirelessly worked for 60 years to neutralize the NIS and abolish the National Security Act, and it is coming closer to reality.

Reason and common sense have long been missing. After defining inter-Korean relations as “a relationship between two hostile countries at war,” North Korea is developing closer military ties with Russia to overtly threaten South Korea. It is time for the people with common sense to put the brakes on the politicians’ perilous legislation destroying the country’s national security.

Translation by the Korea JoongAng Daily staff.