North Influencing Southern Politics?

The National Intelligence Service (NIS) and the prosecution are expected to expand their investigation into the so-called ‘Ilsim Association Gate,’ under which several figures are under suspicion of illegally contacting North Korea.

The investigation confirmed that North Korea used Chang Min-ho, 44, who was apprehended on October 24, and the Ilsim Association as a channel not only for collecting information of political circles in South Korea but also for directly intervening in the domestic politics of the South.

Therefore, it is very likely that the scope of investigation is going beyond just questioning members of the Democratic Labor Party (DLP) into politicians as whole.

How did North Korea attempt to intervene in domestic politics of South Korea?-

It is alleged that, anxious about expected landslide victory of the Grand National Party (GNP) in local election of this May, North Korea contacted DLP’s vice secretarial head Choi Ki-young (arrested) and made the DLP to build an alliance with the Uri Party.

Despite the allegation, Choi denied the charge, saying, “My position was not powerful enough.”

Even though there was a certain move to seek alliance between two parties, particularly in the region of Yeongnam, at that time, it didn’t really happen.

In addition to this, it is alleged that North Korea tried to influence the rejection of a bill for resignation of Yoon Kwang-ung, the defense minister at the time, which was presented June, 2005, because the investigation confirmed that Choi reported to Chang that the DLP would reject the bill during that time. In fact, the bill didn’t pass in the assembly then because of the rejection of the DLP and the Uri Party.

Besides, the NIS and the prosecution revealed that North Korea requested Choi to send information about DLP candidates who were expected to run in the 2004 general election via Sohn Jong-mok (arrested), which adds more confidence to alleged North Korean intervention in the 2004 general election in South Korea.

It is also reported that the NIS and the prosecution secured evidence that the North ordered to stress the GNP’s antagonism against the North and admiration for United States at the public debates during the election campaign period.

North Korea also attempted to gather information about South Korean political circle’s reaction to its recent initiative for nuclear programs. According to the outcomes of the investigation, the North ordered Chang and members of the Ilsim Association to check the reaction of both civic and political circles in the South.

Should civic groups be under investigation as well?-

The NIS and the prosecution currently view that North Korea used former student activist Lee Jin-gang (arrested) to check civic groups because it found that Lee presented a report to Chang in 2002 that stressed, “We should use civic group’s interests on environment issues as a source to draw anti-American sentiment.”

In addition to this, the authorities found evidence that Chang attempted to contact Kim, executive member of civic group working for environmental issues in South Korea, via Lee. This is based on documents that were found during investigation on Jang’s office and houses, which include Lee’s promise “to win the confidence of Kim.”

However, Lee denied this charge, saying, “Kim has confidence in his activities as a civic group member. Besides, Kim showed strong opposition against the North’s nuclear program. How could you expect that I tried to convince Kim to admire Kim Jong Il?” In fact, the civic group, Kim belongs to, announced a statement that criticizes the North nuke right after the North’s announcement on its nuclear test.

The issues that this civic group focused on were environmental ones related to the U.S forces in Korea such as the incident of United States Forces Korea’s formalin outflow to the Han river, the U.S. camp oil outflow incident, and environmental pollution in the U.S. camp in Korea.

In regard to this, the NIS has found evidence that the five figures from civic groups met North Korean officials of unification front department at Workers’ Party at a hotel in Shenyang, China this August and started investigation on track of their activities in China, which increases possibility of expansion of investigation into civic circles now.

will71@donga.com