Hyundai said the money was for business rights but the court ruled the payment was to facilitate the inter-Korean summit in 2000 with leader Kim Jong-il, and came through the NIS. Park served about eight months in prison before he was pardoned.

Park said at his confirmation hearing on Monday that the payment was “inappropriate” and that he complied with the court ruling but the verdict was wrong because the money was wired by Hyundai without his knowledge.

Opposition lawmakers said Park’s appointment could send the wrong message to Pyongyang and Washington. Moon is trying to restart inter-Korean economic projects even as nuclear negotiations have stalled.

The NIS could play a key role in behind-the-scenes negotiations with the North but the agency’s opaque structure has prompted calls for an overhaul. Many former directors and senior officials have been imprisoned for illegal political meddling.

“I don’t believe the government would seek illicit financial transactions for another summit, but there would be greater temptations to resort to an abnormal approach in finding a breakthrough with North Korea,” said Cho Tae-yong, an opposition lawmaker who was formerly a deputy national security adviser and nuclear negotiator.

South Korea and US ease rocket fuel restrictions as Seoul seeks ‘unblinking eye’ to monitor Pyongyang

Park vowed to transparently carry out policy and steer clear of illegal activity.

“I would help bring a breakthrough in inter-Korean relations and respond with reform that cleans up the dark side of the NIS history,” he told Moon during an appointment ceremony on Wednesday.

He was sentenced to one-and-a-half years in prison in 1988 on charges of possessing North Korean propaganda materials and hosting protests that might cause “social unrest”, but was pardoned six months later.

“When I was young, our primary cause was to accomplish unification, because dictators exploited the national division to persecute us democracy activists,” Lee said in 2018. “Some people called us North followers but that’s not true, though we might have a warmer heart than others toward the North and greater patience to achieve peace.”

Kim Jong-un says North Korea’s nuclear weapons will prevent future wars

During his confirmation hearing on Friday, Lee faced off with lawmaker Thae Yong-ho, a North Korean defector, who questioned whether Lee still harboured belief in the Juche philosophy, prompting angry denials.

Some human-rights activists also criticised Lee for defending the Unification Ministry’s controversial decision to revoke the licences of defector groups that send anti-Pyongyang propaganda leaflets to the North.