[Editorial] Saenuri needs to finally clear the air over false NLL scandal

Posted on : 2014-05-10 13:47 KST Modified on : 2014-05-10 13:47 KST

In the 2012 presidential election, the Saenuri Party (NFP) persistently attacked the opposition claiming that former President Roh Moo-hyun offered to “abandon” part of South Korea’s territory around the Northern Limit Line (NLL) in the West (Yellow) Sea during an inter-Korean summit in 2007. One of the biggest bulldogs was lawmaker Yoon Sang-hyun. Now, having departed his post as Saenuri’s senior floor leader on May 8, he has pulled a complete 180, saying Roh “never one used the term ‘abandon’” and admitting, “I don’t think it was about that.”

There’s no way of knowing why Yoon made this kind of turnaround. But it’s certainly significant, since he admitted in no uncertain terms that there never was any talk about “abandoning territory.” At the same time, Yoon is also a core member of President Park Geun-hye’s wing of the National Assembly, a close associate who served as the Saenuri representative on the Intelligence Committee during the election. In other words, he was in a position to know the facts about the NLL flap. Now that he has come out denying the crux of the whole issue - Roh’s alleged talk about “abandoning” South Korean territory - the Saenuri’s whole argument has been completely undermined.

It wouldn’t be going too far to call the NLL furor a political maneuver. Senior party figures worked tirelessly throughout the election to stoke the fire and use it for political gains. Kim Moo-sung, who chaired the party’s election committee headquarters, previously admitted to illegally acquiring the supposed top-secret summit transcripts. “I had already read the transcripts before the last presidential election,” he said at the time. “I cried as I read that text when I was in Busan campaigning, and the reporters hadn’t even covered it yet.” A recording that surfaced right before the election had Kwon Young-se, now South Korea’s ambassador to China, talking about “making this public if we get in power.” Under the circumstances, it seems reasonable to conclude that senior Saenuri figures acquired the transcripts illegally and decided to use them for the election, all while knowing full well that the transcripts had no mention of giving up South Korea’s claim at the NLL.

The National Intelligence Service bears its own share of responsibility. When the agency found itself under fire and targeted for a parliamentary audit around electiontime over evidence of an illegal online opinion manipulation campaign, director Nam Jae-joon decided out of nowhere to release the full transcripts to the public. Not only that, but the NIS version also twisted and selectively edited Roh’s language.

Now that Yoon has made his belated confession, we cannot simply wave it off as a trip down memory lane. The NLL controversy isn’t just about twisting the summit statements of a former President, or the ruling party putting them to malicious use in an election. It was a scandal with many serious consequences, with state secrets illegally leaked and made public and used politically by the NIS. Now is the time for the Saenuri Party to clear the air on all the particulars and apologize to the public. Kim Moo-sung in particular is the same person who once irresponsibly said he had read the contents of the transcripts “in a tabloid.” If he has any plans of becoming his party’s next chairman, he needs to act responsibly and come clean on this issue. It’s also become even clearer just why President Park needs to fire Nam Jae-joon as NIS director.

Please direct questions or comments to [english@hani.co.kr]

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