Investigation Committee Says Cases Were Manipulated

The Committee for Looking into the Country’s Past Wrongdoings (Chairman: Oh Chung-il) under the National Intelligence Service (NIS) yesterday defined a case involving the National Democratic Youth Association (NDYA), and a case involving the People Revolution Party (PRP), which occurred in 1974 under the Park Chung-hee administration, as cases manipulated at the order of then-President Park.

During a press conference in the NIS building on the same day, the committee announced that then Korean Central Intelligence Agency (Director: Kim Hyeong-wuk) made up a fake story in which it connected the first PRP case in 1964 with a student movement in order to clamp down on the movement led by students who opposed the government’s attempt to normalize diplomatic relations between South Korea and Japan by creating the PRP, which it insisted had been done at the instruction of North Korea.

The committee explained that prosecutors belonging to the public security division of the Seoul District Prosecutors’ Office tendered their resignations while insisting that the first PRP case should not be indicted on the grounds that there was not enough evidence, but then-Prosecutor-General Shin Jik-su, who served as deputy director of the Korean Central Intelligence Agency, pushed ahead with the indictment.

In 1974, the Korean Central Intelligence Agency (Director: Shin Jik-su) concluded that university students who were against the Yusin Regime made an attempt to overthrow the country by creating the NDYA.

At the time, the Korean Central Intelligence Agency also announced that the PRP pulled the NDYA’s strings while seeking to recreate itself.

The committee said, “When the NDYA case occurred, then-President Park came to the fore and arrested a total of 1,000 ordinary people and students without arrest warrants by distorting students’ protests against the government as a people’s revolution attempt masterminded by communists.”

The committee added, “The reason eight figures who were involved in the PRP case were put to death just 18 hours after the Supreme Court sentenced them to death was due to President Park’s opinion.”

The committee, however, failed to present specific statements and evidence that would implicate President Park in executing the death sentences.

Meanwhile, the committee announced that it will have an interview with former President Kim Dae-jung in a bid to probe into the case in which Kim was kidnapped in 1973 on December 15.

Myoung-Gun Lee gun43@donga.com lovesong@donga.com