Prosecutors Question Kim Woo-jung on Illegal Lobby Suspicion

The Central Investigations Unit of the Supreme Prosecutor’s Office, which is investigating the former president of Daewoo Group Kim Woo-jung on a suspected window dressing charge, questioned Kim in a probe to find out whether Kim tried to channel over 10 billion won through Cho Poong-un, an expatriate businessman in the U.S., to then President Kim Dae-jung in an lobbying effort shortly before the former business tycoon left the country in October 1999.

The Prosecutor’s Office is also reviewing measures to charge Daewoo’s former president with embezzlement in violation of the additional punishment law for special economic crimes for delivering $44.3 million (about 45 billion won) to KMC International in Hong Kong, of which Cho was an executive, in June 1999.

The Prosecutor’s Office confirmed that Kim Woo-jung delivered funds from BFC, Daewoo’s overseas financial organization, to KMC before KMC bought shares in Daewoo Information Communications.

Kim Woo-jung is said to have explained that the money in question had been borrowed from Cho and kept at BFC before Kim paid back Cho.

However, the Prosecutor’s Office said, “Kim has yet to prove his explanation.”

Meanwhile, Choi Kyung-hwan, an aide to Kim Dae-jung, flatly denied the allegations that Kim Woo-jung sent the former president lobbying funds seeking a “buy-out,” saying that such allegations were “completely groundless.”

Choi said, “Former President Kim never received illicit funds. Some people sent in lobbying money even after the political funds law was revised and enacted on November 14, 1997, but the money were all sent back.”

jin0619@donga.com