Ruling and opposition parties locking horns over NIS investigation

Posted on : 2013-08-01 15:37 KST Modified on : 2019-10-19 20:29 KST
Investigation into alleged political interference might not go ahead if parties can’t agree on witnesses
 Democratic Party chairman Kim Han-gil said the public was “enraged” and that his party had “run out of patience.”
Democratic Party chairman Kim Han-gil said the public was “enraged” and that his party had “run out of patience.”

By Kim Su-heon, staff reporter

National Assembly discussions on a hearing to investigate the National Intelligence Service’s alleged interference in last year’s presidential election broke down on July 31 over a disagreement between the ruling Saenuri Party (NFP) and the opposition over witness selection.

The witness selection must be completed by July 31 for the hearings to go on as scheduled on August 7 and 8. Now, the failure to reach a compromise is raising questions over whether the hearing - or even the NIS organizational report and hearing, as well as other parts of the investigation - will take place at all.

The situation is currently moving toward an all-out clash. The Democratic Party (DP), which is the largest opposition party, delivered a scathing rebuke of the Saenuri Party and said it would be taking emergency action with floor negotiations as well as a battle outside the Assembly. The Saenuri Party is accusing the DP of deliberately sabotaging the parliamentary investigation.

Speaking at a press conference called after the breakdown of the talks, DP chairman Kim Han-gil said the public was “enraged” and that his party had “run out of patience.”

“We’ve taken all we can take to get this parliamentary investigation going in a normal fashion,” he said. “Effective immediately, we are going into emergency mode and working with the public on a campaign to restore democracy and reform the NIS.”

The party plans to expand its current headquarters to investigate the NIS’s “political maneuvering” and reform the organization into what it is calling a “citizen campaign headquarters for restoring democracy and reforming the NIS,” with Kim as its first chairman. It also plans to hold a general meeting of its lawmakers in Seoul Plaza in front of city hall on August 1 to launch the campaign outside the Assembly.

The move prompted a fuming Saenuri Party to accuse the DP of a “self-destructive abandonment of the parliamentary investigation.”

Yoon Sang-hyun, the Saenuri Party’s senior floor leader, blasted the response at his own talk with the press after Kim’s conference.

“Now that the DP has failed in its attempt to make ridiculous allegations at the parliamentary investigation and turn this into an arena for a political attack to dispute the outcome of the election [won by the Saenuri Party candidate Park Geun-hye], they’ve decided they’re not going to play the game anymore,” Yoon said.

“They are wrong to view an extraparliamentary battle as a negotiation tactic. It’s not negotiation; it‘s intimidation,” he continued.

Previously, the two parties’ secretaries for the NIS investigation - Kwon Seong-dong on the Saenuri Side and Jung Cheong-rae on the DP side - met twice at the National Assembly in an attempt to resolve their dispute over the witnesses.

But no agreement could be reached on issues such as whether to issue summons to appear for former NIS chief Won Sei-hoon and former Seoul Metropolitan Police Agency chief Kim Yong-pan to ensure they show up at the hearing.

Kwon accused the DP of trying to sabotage the process by refusing to negotiate.

“We even said we would agree to the issuance of warrants as long as we put language in the agreement about ‘nonattendance without justifiable cause,’” he said.

The Saenuri Party sent the DP an ultimatum, saying it would cancel the NIS organizational report and hearing on Aug. 5 if it did not agree to the proposal by noon Aug. 1.

Jung rejected the offer, arguing that there needed to be “a written guarantee of the witnesses‘ attendance, summons to appear, and a guarantee by bipartisan agreement to make a joint complaint to the prosecutor if they do not attend.”

He also said Saenuri Party lawmaker Kim Moo-sung and South Korean ambassador to China Kwon Young-se should be called as witnesses.

With the deadline looming on Aug. 15, the investigation now faces a greater likelihood of ending in a whimper if there are no dramatic breakthroughs.

 

Please direct questions or comments to [english@hani.co.kr]

 

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