Confusion over Cheong Wa Dae’s Pro-North Website Policy

It was confirmed that Cheong Wa Dae, despite opposition by relevant ministries, is promoting the termination of the ban on Internet access to pro-North Korea websites.

This is triggering criticism that Cheong Wa Dae is forcibly pushing for lifting the access ban on pro-North Korea websites in recognition of the inter-Korean summit.

It was also confirmed that the Ministry of Information and Communication, on September 18, had ordered 13 domestic social organizations to erase 1,660 articles posted on their websites in 10 days.

The Ministry of Information and Communication advised social organizations to take action on several occasions, but this is the first time it ordered them to erase articles.

“This order is irrelevant from Cheong Wa Dae’s plan to terminate the blockade on access to pro-North websites,” said a person related to the Ministry of Information and Communication. “In case the social organizations fail to erase pro-North articles by 12 o’clock at night September 28, we plan to file criminal charges.”

It was also revealed that the prosecution, police, and National Intelligence Service previously held a meeting to revise whether to permit access to 42 pro-North websites currently blocked in South Korea and concluded that the blockade on access should not be terminated.

According to a document Grand National Party assemblyman Lee Sang-bae collected from a number of public security staffers, three officials from the police and National Intelligence Service, held a meeting at the public security division of the Supreme Court for two hours on August 31 as ordered by the Supreme Prosecutors’ Office.

“This meeting was ordered by the Ministry of Justice. We are to examine the 42 blocked websites and see if we can find reasons to keep them blocked,” said a prosecution official at the meeting, according to a source.

The National Police Agency and the National Intelligence Service are known to have expressed negative views to the prosecution on September 7 and 8 on terminating the blockade against the websites.

The prosecution collected the opinions of National Intelligence Service and National Police agency and reported a negative opinion to the Ministry of Justice on terminating the blockade, and the Ministry of Justice passed that on to Cheong Wa Dae.

“Although Korea’s public security institutions expressed negative views on the termination of the blockade, Cheong Wa Dae is forcibly promoting the termination on its own,” said assemblyman Lee Sang-bae. “Such a sudden promotion can only be construed as appeasing the tastes of North Korea when the inter-Korean summit is around the corner.”

Regarding this, spokesperson of Cheong Wa Dae Cheon Ho-seon explained, “We don’t mean to terminate the blockade with the aim of disturbing the sentiment of South Koreans, and we have not made any specific plans.”

ditto@donga.com