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Moon Jae-in
AsiaEast Asia

Moon Jae-in wants improved ties with North Korea but his two new point men have chequered pasts

  • Park Jie-won, the new director of intelligence agency, was jailed for helping Hyundai send illicit payments to the North
  • Lee In-young, the new Unification Minister, was in the past accused of revering Kim Il-sung and his Juche ideology

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North Korean leader Kim Jong-un and South Korean President Moon Jae-in at the border village of Panmunjom in 2018. Photo: AP
Reuters
South Korean President Moon Jae-in’s new point men on North Korea face a daunting challenge: they must engineer a breakthrough in strained ties amid public scrutiny of their history with Pyongyang, which once landed them in prison.
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Moon this week appointed Park Jie-won, 78, as director of the National Intelligence Agency (NIS) and Lee In-young, 56, as the Unification Minister, seeking progress with North Korea as a major legacy in his final two years in office.
The two men, both long-time lawmakers, are key advocates of Moon’s drive for inter-Korean rapprochement but their political pasts rekindled controversies and debates that have shaped Seoul’s relations with Pyongyang. Both of them have a dramatic history with North Korea.

A former businessman, Park was sentenced to three years in prison for helping the late former president Kim Dae-jung arrange for Hyundai, which was operating North Korea businesses, to send US$450 million to Pyongyang.

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.

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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.

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