[Editorial] Prosecution’s Investigation Be Focused on Tracking Banking Records

The prosecution, upon filing of the criminal claim by former President’s Chief of Staff Han Kwang-ok (currently MDP’s Congressman), has begun its investigation. But the attitude it has shown is not warmhearted, to say the least. The prosecution seems to put a limit on the case to begin with. It looks like treating it as one of those defamation cases. It is an unreasonable reaction on the part of the prosecution since, in order to determine whether defamation was committed when former head of Industrial Bank Um Nak-yong said before a congressional hearing, “Former Chief of Staff Han ordered the loan to be lent over the phone,” it is necessary to conduct a wide-range investigation into the procedures regarding the loan.

This way, it is highly possible that the prosecution will contradict itself later on. If it transpires that some political pressure was mobilized to get the loan out, will it just drop the charge against Mr. Um and close the case without prosecuting the people who abused their power in pressing for the loan only because it has nothing to do with the defamation charge? The other way around, if the prosecution fails to find out whether or not a political figure really pulled the strings, will it just prosecute Mr. Um, leaving the suspicions as to the loaning procedures and the whereabouts of the money used unsolved? The prosecution itself would surely know that either of the situations sounds reasonable.

In addition, the case is assigned to the criminal division of Seoul District Prosecutors’ Office, where each single state’s attorney has to handle hundreds of criminal cases every month. It is absurd. It is not one of those petty criminal cases. Since the government, even in the face of the concrete and detailed testimony and circumstantial evidence supporting the allegation, is not making any efforts to easily find out the truth, more and more people are asking for Congress to commence the National Investigation. And the prosecutors know it. Nonetheless, we are getting the impression that they want to treat it as a petty case.

The beginning point of this case is the allegation of a secret deal between North and South. And at around the center of the case lie many suspicions, for example, that a powerful political figure used his power, that the loan was abnormal in its amount and procedure, and that where the money was really used. Among other things, if the prosecution just stops short of touching on the pressure part of the case, it will end up in raising more new suspicions. Of course, we understand that the investigation may be flexible according to the development. But, what we really care is the will of the prosecution. We want to know whether the prosecution really intends to get to the bottom of the case.

As we have stressed in this column over and over, it is not so difficult to find out the truth concerning this matter. Now, there is no longer a legal barrier. Thus, the prosecution should start the account-tracking right now.