» Members of the United New Democratic Party (predecessor to today’s Democratic Party) urge presidential candidate Lee Myung-bak to resign over his alleged role in the BBK affair at the National Assembly on December 17, 2007, just two days before the presidential election, when a video clip in which Lee said he founded the now-defunct asset management company BBK was made public.

A Seoul district court yesterday ruled in favor of President Lee Myung-bak in his libel lawsuit against The Hankyoreh for damaging his reputation by publishing an interview “without making enough of an effort” to confirm the related facts.

On August 17, 2007, just months before the presidential election, The Hankyoreh reported in its front and fourth pages an exclusive interview with Kim Kyung-joon, a Korean American businessman who was involved in a stock manipulation scam in 2001 through an investment firm named BBK. During the interview, he claimed that Lee was the owner of the controversial company, prompting the leading presidential candidate to file the suit, seeking 50 million won (US$36,500) in compensation for damages.

Judge Kim Kyun-tae of the Seoul Central District Court ordered the newspaper to pay 30 million won to President Lee.

“The Hankyoreh hurt Lee’s reputation by reporting (the story) without making enough of an effort to confirm the allegations,” Kim said in a statement. He added that the newspaper failed to confirm Kim’s claims that the presidential candidate owned 100 percent of the stock in BBK, LKE Bank and EBK, the financial firms involved in the scam. “The newspaper didn’t make a sufficient effort to confirm whether the contract unveiled by Kim was genuine or not, it only reported his side of the argument,” he said, adding that it also failed to give voice to other arguments contradicting the claim that Lee was the owner of BBK.

In responding to the ruling, The Hankyoreh countered, “The plaintiff, Lee, made at least four public statements, including one in an interview with JoongAng Ilbo and at another in a lecture he gave at a college, saying that he had established BBK. It is nonsense to blame us for having damaged his reputation by reporting the interview with Kim, who made the same remarks.”

Saying that it will appeal the ruling immediately, the newspaper added, “While the lawsuit involving the incumbent president was in progress, an official of the National Intelligence Service called the judge in charge, an apparent attempt to influence the court’s decision.” It continued, “We express our deep regret that the judiciary’s standards were compromised by the government,” saying that it was the judiciary’s job to “put a stop to the government’s attempts to muzzle newspapers critical of its actions.”

The Hankyoreh branch of the National Union of Media Workers issued a statement, saying that “It is the media’s obligation to interview key people involved in incidents involving a leading presidential candidate.” It added that “The court’s ruling is none other than an attempt to gag the media and prevent it from finding the truth.”

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