hankyoreh

(provided by Getty Images)

Police are investigating the spouse of an official at the Embassy of the Netherlands in Korea over an allegation that he hit a Korean man with his car during a dispute over parking.

The Yongsan Police Station on Wednesday said it was looking into the 60-something husband of a Dutch diplomat after it received a call saying that he had driven his car into a Korean man near the Grand Hyatt Seoul hotel in Yongsan District.

The Korean man is known to have stepped out of his car to argue with the diplomat’s husband over parking, after which the latter lightly hit the former with his vehicle.

Police arrived after the Korean man called them, and let the diplomat’s husband go after checking his ID. The black box showed that the driver’s side bumper of the car driven by the diplomat’s husband lightly grazed the local man. The Korean man did not sustain any serious injuries.

The Korean man said the diplomat’s husband used obscenities with him and gave him the middle finger, adding that the diplomat’s husband insisted that this wouldn’t be a problem for him because he has diplomatic immunity.

Police plan to summon the diplomat’s husband for questioning to see if his action was intentional. "[The diplomat’s husband] said through the embassy on the day of the incident that he would comply with the summons," a police source said. "He is coordinating his attendance schedule with the embassy."

This is not the first time this year that a spouse of a foreign diplomat in Seoul has stirred controversy after an altercation with a local. In April, the wife of Belgian Ambassador to Korea Peter Lescouhier ignited public fury in Korea over two instances of assault, resulting in the ambassador being recalled and replaced in July.

By Kim Yoon-ju, staff reporter

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