Disputable overseas trips of lawmakers

With the closure of the special National Assembly session, lawmakers from both the ruling and opposition parties have begun leaving for overseas trips amid mounting public anger with fruitless parliamentary operations.

Following three Assemblymen of the ruling Millennium Democratic Party (MDP) -- Reps. Kang Wun-Tae, Lee Kang-Rae and Jong Bum-Soo -- who left for the United States on August 2, defying their party¡¯s ban on overseas travel, two other MDP lawmakers, Reps. Lee Chong-Kul and Chung Chin-Sok, left for the U.S. on August 3 to participate in the same program.

In addition, there are about 50 more lawmakers who plan to travel abroad on official business within this month. These include members of the Assembly Industry-Energy Standing Committee, Environment-Labor Committee and Unification-Foreign Affairs Committee who are scheduled to visit Europe and Canada, and Latin and South American nations, for on-the-spot inspections, respectively.

However, there is mounting criticism that the legislators plan to participate in overseas junkets intensively in the summer season under the pretext of "parliamentary diplomacy." Due to the summer vacation season, the lawmakers will find it difficult to meet with VIPs in foreign countries, and therefore, they are apt to spend their days enjoying tourist pursuits.

In many cases, the officials of Korea`s overseas missions are obliged to take the trouble of treating and guiding them and arranging their meetings with foreign dignitaries.

Assembly budgets will be provided for the lawmakers¡¯ official overseas visits. In the case of trips to New York, each receives $458 per day for travel expenses.

Each of their entourages will receive an additional $259 per day. Moreover, each lawmaker is customarily given $1000 by the Assembly speaker for their personal use. Given that the lawmakers spend an average of 11 days overseas, each of them will be covered for average expenses of more than 50 million won.

Assembly Secretariat officials disclosed that despite the lawmakers` expensive overseas visits, their reports on the results of their missions are generally poor. They are disappointed by the fact that Korean parliamentary diplomacy is a typical example of a "high-cost, low-efficiency" event.