Dark Cloud of Corruption Hovers over Weather Agency

The Special Criminal Investigation Division of the National Police Agency on Wednesday filed an arrest warrant for Kim, 62, former senior official of the Korea Meteorological Administration (KMA) on charges of forging official documents and pressuring individuals to help a certain company supply its products in the process of the KMA’s introducing a weather forecasting system.

The police also booked seven incumbent employees of the KMA without detention: Seong, 56, who forged documents under Kim’s instruction, and six incumbent weather agency employees who fabricated the price of the weather system.

In addition, the police arrested Heo, 48, and another suspect without detention on charges of handing the KMA’s internal documents to company K, a weather-related equipment supplier, and sought an arrest warrant for another Kim, 38, the CEO of the company K, on charges of supplying cheaper equipment, in place of the contracted equipment, to the KMA.

Former KMA official Kim is alleged to have forged documents in the process of the KMA’s purchasing a low-level wind shear forecasting system, which was scheduled to be installed at the Ulsan Airport in December 2004. He allowed the KMA purchase company K’s high-level wind shear forecast product, which was unsatisfactory for forecasting low-level wind shear, at 1.65 billion won, according to the police.

The police also found that Kim ordered his subordinates, including Seong, to produce false assessment reports which stated that K’s product meets its standard, and to notify the Public Procurement Service.

Kim has been the CEO of K’s affiliate company since retiring from the weather agency last December. He claimed during the police investigation that the introduction of K’s equipment was an instruction given by the then chief weather officer, who passed away last year.

“Apart from Kim, Choi and others forged documents to make K appear to have supplied the product agreed upon in the original contract, despite the fact that it supplied equipment at 1.1 billion won cheaper than the value agreed upon in the contract at the time of KMA’s introduction of the high-level wind shear forecast product,” a police official said.

Chae, 69, who worked for K after retiring from the KMA, was also found that he has leaked more than 6,100 internal documents of the KMA since October 2005 by receiving the ID and the password of the weather agency’s intranet from a former co-worker.

“Company K received various privileges and won 25 out of the 30 KMA outsourcing projects between 2005 and 2006. In terms of the amount of the contracts involved, 97 percent of the money went to K,” a police official said.

surono@donga.com