President Roh Accepts NIS Head Resignation

President Roh Moo-hyun accepted Monday the resignation of Kim Man-bok, head of the National Intelligence Service, who took the blame for leaking excerpts from a confidential dialogue between him and his North Korean counterpart to the media.

The acceptance comes 27 days after Kim offered to quit last month over the leak of a document containing transcripts of conversations between him and Kim Yang Gon, then head of the United Front Department of North Korea’s ruling Workers’ Party, during his trip to Pyongyang on the eve of the Dec. 19 presidential election.

Presidential spokesman Cheon Ho-seon said in yesterday’s briefing, “Although there is still some doubt over whether the transcript should be classified as confidential, President Roh decided to accept Kim’s resignation because Kim did not take appropriate action in accounting for the leakage and therefore has certain responsibility for the incident.”

When asked why President Roh did not immediately accept the resignation last month, Cheon said, “He needed legal review over whether the transcript was confidential and whether Kim’s response violated laws. There were also some concerns that accepting the resignation immediately would not be wise without conducting sufficient review beforehand, especially when some politicians jumped to raise groundless allegations of a possible political maneuvering.”

Cheon added, “The president decided that the chief position at the nation’s top information agency should not be left vacant for long. Therefore, he concluded that accepting the resignation around the time when his ministers are resigning to run for the general elections in April would be most appropriate.”

NIS’s deputy director Lee Su-hyeok will perform as the acting chief until a new chief is officially appointed after a hearing in the next government.

The former NIS director had his resignation ceremony Monday afternoon.

jin0619@donga.com