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Kim Tae-hyo, the first deputy director of the National Security Office, leaves for the US from Incheon International Airport on April 11. (Yonhap)

The Korean presidential office took steps to downplay reports that US intelligence agencies have been spying on South Korea’s National Security Office (NSO) by stating that the two countries’ top defense officials agree that a significant number of the leaked documents were fabricated.

But officials didn’t provide any grounds for concluding that the documents were fake or for denying that the NSO was wiretapped. Instead, they attacked opposition party lawmakers who had highlighted the reports for “counterproductive behavior that debilitates the Korea-US alliance.” The administration appears determined to sweep this issue under the rug before President Yoon Suk-yeol’s upcoming state visit to the US.

The official position adopted by the presidential office on Tuesday is that the allegation about the NSO being under surveillance is an “absurd lie.” The office stressed that the leaked documents themselves were false, without explicitly talking about whether the NSO is being surveilled.

Officials added that the opposition party was “being self-destructive and acting against the national interest” when it claimed that the relocation of the presidential office from the Blue House to Yongsan had created security vulnerabilities.

The presidential office insisted that its current counterespionage systems are much stronger than those used at the Blue House and that its integrated security system and dedicated staff maintain an impregnable level of security. This was more of a “because I said so” declaration of fact than a public explanation of the NSO surveillance allegations.

The previous day, the White House basically acknowledged that documents had been leaked, with one official remarking that there was “no excuse” for the documents being made public. But NSO First Deputy Director Kim Tae-hyo described the surveillance allegations as “fabricated” on Tuesday and said that Korea has nothing to say to the US.

“The US will start looking for the people behind this, and that will take a little time,” he said, suggesting that the Korean government means to wait for an investigation by the US — the very party implicated in the matter.

Kim then pivoted to some poorly timed praise of the US, noting that “the US has the world’s most powerful intelligence organizations, which are a great asset.” With an attitude of that sort, it’s doubtful whether Kim is capable of plainly expressing the Korean position on the spying accusations or asking for a full accounting.

The presidential office instead focused on fending off criticism about the office’s relocation last year, unleashing a political attack on the opposition Democratic Party, which had raised the possibility of security vulnerabilities. “Groups that weaken the alliance will face public resistance,” officials said, while accusing the opposition of “stirring up the public with mudslinging and false accusations.”

The presidential office was trying to reframe allegations about US surveillance as a debate about the office’s relocation to Yongsan, making it an issue of domestic politics. In short, Yoon and his aides are meek lambs with the US but roaring lions with other Koreans.

We’re not ignorant of the importance of Korea’s alliance with the US. But how can Seoul engage in normal diplomacy when it bends itself backward to agree with the US and keeps acting so obsequious?

It’s time for the presidential office to seriously review concerns about the security infrastructure and, after definitively establishing what happened, to ask the US to apologize and pledge to prevent the issue from recurring.

That would also help establish the relationship of trust in the Korea-US alliance that the Yoon administration is always harping on.

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