Assembly to grill witnesses on public funds Mon.

A National Assembly special investigation committee will question two witnesses and 23 others in a hearing on the alleged illegal loan scandal involving Hanvit Bank, Monday.

The two witnesses are Park Jie-Won, former minister of culture and tourism and Lee Woon-Young, former head of the Yongdong branch of the Korea Credit Guarantee Fund. The parliamentary hearing will feature a cross examination of Park and Lee.

In the previous hearing on Saturday, Doh Jong-Tae, former head of the inspection office at the headquarters of Hanvit Bank, testified that bank vice president Lee Soo-Gil and Lee Chok-Yop, an auditor, ordered him not to conduct an inspection of Kwanak branch, which allegedly offered the illegal loans.

He said he received the order from auditor Lee, who said vice president Lee asked him not to investigate the Kwanak branch on Jan. 19 last year.

However, both denied in their respective testimony that they gave such an instruction to Doh.

Shin Chang-Sop, former head of Kwanak branch, said that he managed to persuade Cho Tae-Il, who was in charge of loans to Arc World, not to admit that he allowed the loans, believing a ``figure with real power¡¯¡¯ when the illegal loans were detected by the inspection team from the bank¡¯s main office on Aug. 13.

Kim Jung-Hoon jnghn@donga.com