South Korea's former President Moon indicted for alleged bribery
ADVERTISEMENT
Former South Korean President Moon Jae-in was indicted Thursday on bribery charges, accused of accepting illegal favours through a no-show job arranged for his then-son-in-law during his term in office.
Prosecutors say Moon received bribes worth 217 million won (€133,239) from Thai Eastar Jet founder Lee Sang-jik, who allegedly provided wages, housing, and other financial support to Moon's former son-in-law between 2018 and 2020.
Lee, a former campaign associate of Moon's, was also indicted for bribery and breach of trust.
The son-in-law was reportedly hired at Lee's Thailand-based airline company in a director-level role despite having no aviation experience and carried out only minor duties while claiming to be working remotely from South Korea.
Lee was later appointed to lead a state-funded agency and nominated for parliament by Moon's party, though prosecutors say they found no direct evidence that Moon facilitated these roles.
Related
South Korean lawmakers impeach acting President Han Duck-soo
South Korea impeachment motion stalls after governing lawmakers boycott vote
The indictment comes ahead of South Korea's June 3 presidential election, following the ousting of conservative President Yoon Suk Yeol, who now
faces trial
over an attempt to impose martial law.
Moon's allies in the Democratic Party denounced the charges as politically motivated, accusing prosecutors loyal to Yoon of trying to discredit the former liberal leader ahead of the election.
Despite the indictment, liberal candidate Lee Jae-myung remains the frontrunner in a fractured race, though he too is on trial for separate corruption allegations.
Two men pose with an image of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, left, and South Korean President Moon Jae-in displayed at a park near the presidential Blue House in Seoul, Sout
Ahn Young-joon/Copyright 2018 The AP. All rights reserved.
Moon served as president of South Korea from 2017 to 2022. He is best known for his push to reconcile with rival North Korea as he met North Korean leader Kim Jong Un three times and facilitated the start of the high-stakes nuclear diplomacy between Kim and US President Donald Trump.
Moon's supporters credit him with achieving now-stalled cooperation with North Korea and avoiding major armed clashes, but opponents say he was a naive North Korea sympathizer who ended up helping the North buy time to advance its nuclear program in the face of international sanctions and pressure.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Euronews
14 hours ago
- Euronews
Italians to vote on easing citizenship rules amid low turnout fears
Italians will begin voting on Sunday in a referendum on whether to relax citizenship laws, but there are fears that turnout will be so low that it will invalidate the result. The two-day referendum, ending on Monday, will also ask voters if they agree with reversing a decade-old liberalisation of the labour market. The labour market questions aim to make it more difficult to dismiss some employees and increase compensation for workers who are made redundant by small businesses, reversing a law passed by a Democratic Party (PD) government around a decade ago. But it's the question about citizenship which has attracted the most attention among Italian voters. Concerns about the scale of immigration helped push Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni's far-right Brothers of Italy party to power in 2022. Italians will be asked if they support the idea of reducing the period of residence required to apply for Italian citizenship from 10 years to five. Organisers of the referendum say that, if passed, it could affect around 2.5 million foreign nationals in Italy. Italy's birth rate is in steep decline, and economists say the country needs more foreigners to boost its stagnant economy. For foreigners in Italy, the primary channel to citizenship is through naturalisation, which can occur after 10 years of continuous residence in the country. The applicant must also demonstrate that they have integrated into society, possess a minimum income, have a clean criminal record, and can speak Italian adequately. The residence prerequisite is considerably shorter for citizens of other EU member states, who have to wait just four years to apply. Riccardo Magi, secretary of the liberal Più Europa party, supports decreasing the length of time required to apply for citizenship. He calls the current rules "old and unjust" and says they have only been in force for so long because successive governments have lacked the political will for change. Magi thinks the referendum proposal is reasonable because it only reduces the residence time requirement while leaving the other requirements unchanged. He says the current law "forces hundreds of thousands of girls and boys born or raised in Italy to live as foreigners in what is also their country." Magi also believes the amendment would have indirect positive effects on many of these minors born or resident in Italy, to whom citizenship would be passed on by at least one New Italian parent. "Those are who are rooted, work, pay taxes, study... must be able to vote and participate in public votes. This is the liberal idea of citizenship," he said. But the Noi Moderati party has said its position on the referendum is a resounding no, the centrist party's vice-president Maria Chiara Fazio told Euronews. "Citizenship is the deepest link between the state and the individual," Fazio stressed. "It cannot be the subject of a referendum simplification: it is a topic that requires in-depth study, mutual listening and a serious parliamentary debate." Fazio defended the structure of the current law, but acknowledged some bureaucratic aspects need to be tightened up as they leave many candidates in limbo. But the Noi Moderati's position on the referendum is not unusual. The leaders of two of the coalition parties, Antonio Tajani of Forza Italia and Matteo Salvini of Lega or the League, have both said they will not vote on Sunday. Meloni will attend a polling station but will also not cast a ballot. That indifference to the referendum appears to have trickled down to regular voters too. A Demopolis institute poll carried out in May estimated turnout to be between 31% and 39%, well short of the threshold required to make the result binding. The leader of the opposition Conservative Party, Kemi Badenoch, has indicated that a US-style blanket travel ban on foreign citizens could be "viable" in the United Kingdom, stressing that it should no longer be the "world's softest touch." The Leader of the Opposition said on Friday that Britain is being "mugged" by illegal migration, local media reported. She added "parliament needs to be able to decide who comes into the country, for how long and who needs to leave," explaining that this can be done through measures such as travel bans. "There are scenarios where this is viable." In a resurrection of his controversial first term "Muslim ban", Trump on Wednesday announced travel bans to the United States for citizens from 12 countries he has deemed "out of control." It will apply to people from Afghanistan, Myanmar, Chad, the Republic of Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Haiti, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen. The ban is set to go into effect on Monday and will bar nationals from these countries from entering the US unless they qualify for an exemption. Travel restrictions will also come into force for citizens of a further seven countries on the same day. However, Badenoch then went on to say she didn't fully support a Trump-style ban for the UK, adding that she hadn't seen which countries were affected. "That doesn't mean that I agree with what Donald Trump has done. I'm much more focused on…what's happening here." Badenoch made the remarks after a speech at the Royal United Services Institute in Westminster in which she launched a commission tasked with analysing leaving the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR). The international human rights treaty between the 47 states which are members of the Council of Europe (CoE) protects the basic rights and freedoms of people. She argued that the UK had "lost control of the asylum system" and is "being blocked". Referring to the ECHR, she vowed to crackdown on "lawfare" which she said is obstructing border control and is used to stop migrant deportations. 'I have always said that if we need to leave the convention we should and having now considered the question closely I do believe that we will likely need to leave because I am yet to see a clear and coherent way to fix this within our current legal structures." Badenoch has enlisted a senior barrister to review the legalities surrounding the a potential UK withdrawal from the ECHR. The senior lawyer is expected to provide his report at the Tory party conference later this year, at which point the Tory leader will make a final decision on the ECHR "problem." However, she stressed she would not do so without a clear plan. Leader of the far-right Reform UK party, Nigel Farage, stated earlier this year that the first thing he would do as Prime Minister would be to withdraw the UK from the ECHR. Meanwhile, the current Labour government has ruled out leaving it. Last month, nine EU countries signed an open letter calling for the ECHR to be reinterpreted to allow for policy changes on migration. The signatories, who believe it should be easier to expel migrants who commit crimes, said the ECHR's interpretation of the convention should be examined. The CoE's Secretary Alain Berset criticised their politicising of the court.
Euronews
20 hours ago
- Euronews
EU deplores US sanctions on ICC judges, including Slovenian
The European Union has roundly deplored the United States for sanctioning four judges of the International Criminal Court (ICC), including one citizen from the bloc, Slovenia's Beti Hohler, further deepening the divide between transatlantic allies. The sanctions, which also target nationals from Benin, Uganda and Peru, were announced on Thursday by US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who said the decision was based on the court's "baseless and politicised" investigations of war crimes allegedly committed by US forces in Afghanistan and Israel in the Gaza Strip. The second probe led to arrest warrants on Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Natayanhu and former Defence Minister Yoav Gallant. Judge Hohler ruled in favour of the orders. As a result of the measures, the four judges will be unable to access their property and assets on US soil and will be blocked from making transactions with American entities. The bans risk hindering the magistrates' ability to perform their day-to-day work. "We call on our allies to stand with us against this disgraceful attack," Rubio said. Rubio's call was met with the opposite reaction: emphatic support for the Hague-based tribunal and forceful rejection of the sanctions. "The ICC holds perpetrators of the world's gravest crimes to account & gives victims a voice. It must be free to act without pressure," said Ursula von der Leyen, the president of the European Commission. "We will always stand for global justice & the respect of international law." António Costa, the president of the European Council, voiced a similar message. "The EU strongly supports the International Criminal Court, a cornerstone of international justice," Costa wrote on social media. The ICC "does not stand against nations—it stands against impunity. We must protect its independence and integrity. The rule of law must prevail over the rule of power." The Netherlands, which serves as the host country for the ICC, also expressed strong condemnation, stressing the tribunal's work must remain "as unhindered as possible". "The Netherlands disapproves of the new sanctions against officials of the International Criminal Court," said Dutch Foreign Minister Caspar Veldkamp. "Independent international courts and tribunals must be able to carry out their work without hindrance. We stand firmly behind the Court." Rejecting outside "pressure on judicial institutions", the Slovenian government said it would provide Judge Beti Hohler with "all necessary support in the performance of her mandate in the current situation". The country called on Brussels to immediately activate the so-called blocking statute, a decades-long regulation meant to protect EU individuals and companies from the extraterritorial application of sanctions by non-EU countries. The law was introduced in reaction to the sanctions that Washington introduced in 1996 against Cuba, Iran and Libya, which had ripple effects on European operators that engaged in legitimate trade with the three countries, particularly Cuba. The blocking statute came back to the fore in 2018, when the first Donald Trump administration withdrew from the Iran nuclear deal, reintroduced sanctions that had been previously lifted and threatened to punish companies for doing business with Tehran, regardless of their geographic location or ownership. Although Brussels tried to mitigate the damaging impact of these secondary sanctions, many European companies voluntarily cut off relations with Iran out of fear of losing access to America's highly profitable, dollar-based market. Neither von der Leyen nor Costa spoke about the statute in their responses. In a statement, the ICC insisted it would "continue its work undeterred, in strict accordance with the Rome Statute and the principles of fairness and due process". "Targeting those working for accountability does nothing to help civilians trapped in conflict. It only emboldens those who believe they can act with impunity," it said. "These sanctions are not only directed at designated individuals, they also target all those who support the Court, including nationals and corporate entities of States Parties. They are aimed against innocent victims in all situations before the Court." The US, which is not a party to the 1998 Rome Statute, has long had tense relations with the ICC, viewing with suspicion its ability to conduct probes into nationals around the world. The arrest warrant against Netanyahu was met with bipartisan condemnation in Washington and prompted a renewed assault by the Trump administration. Earlier this year, Hungary openly defied the ICC by ignoring the warrant and inviting Netanyahu to Budapest. Hungary later announced its intention to withdraw from the Rome Statute, becoming the first member state to do so. Russia launched a large-scale missile and drone attack on Ukrainian cities overnight on Friday, killing at least five people and injuring more than 70. According to Ukraine's Air Force spokesperson Yuri Ihnat, Kyiv forces intercepted 368 out of 407 drones and shot down 36 out of 45 missiles, including four out of six ballistic Iskander missiles launched by Russia. Ukraine's Air Forces activated the air raid alerts in all Ukrainian regions last night, warning people that multiple Russian bombers had taken off for the attack. Many people proceeded to bomb shelters with the warning. Ukraine's capital Kyiv was hit the hardest. The city Mayor Vitali Klitschko said search and rescue operations were under way at several locations. Multiple explosions were heard in Kyiv overnight, where falling debris sparked fires across several districts as air defence systems attempted to intercept incoming targets, said Tymur Tkachenko, head of the Kyiv City Administration. 'Our air defence crews are doing everything possible. But we must protect one another — stay safe,' Tkachenko wrote on Telegram. Authorities reported damage in several districts, and rescue workers were responding at multiple locations. They urged residents to seek shelter. In Solomyanskyi district, a fire broke out on the 11th floor of a 16-story residential building. Emergency services evacuated three people from the apartment, and rescue operations were ongoing. Another fire broke out in a metal warehouse. Tkachenko said the metro tracks between two stations in Kyiv were damaged in the attack, but no fire or injuries occurred. In the northern Chernihiv region, a Shahed drone exploded near an apartment building, shattering windows and doors, according to regional military administration chief Dmytro Bryzhynskyi. He added that explosions from ballistic missiles were also recorded on the outskirts of the city. The nighttime attack came hours after US President Donald Trump said it might be better to let Ukraine and Russia 'fight for a while' before pulling them apart and pursuing peace, in comments that were a remarkable detour from Trump's often-stated appeals to stop the three-year war. Trump spoke as he met with Germany's new Chancellor Friedrich Merz, who appealed to him as the 'key person in the world' who could halt the bloodshed by pressuring Russian President Vladimir Putin. Trump this week spoke on the phone with Putin, who vowed to respond "very strongly" to Ukraine's daring drone attacks on Russian military airfields that had taken place on Sunday.
Euronews
21 hours ago
- Euronews
North Korea salvages capsized destroyer after Kim slams failed launch
North Korea has salvaged a capsized destroyer and moored it at the northeastern port of Chongjin, state media confirmed Friday, as repair efforts continue on what Kim Jong-un has labelled a 'significant asset' for the country's nuclear-armed military. The state-run Korean Central News Agency said naval experts will examine the vessel's hull before moving it to a dry dock in the nearby port of Rajin, where restoration work is expected to take between seven and 10 days. The development aligns with assessments from South Korea's military and satellite imagery taken Thursday by Planet Labs, which showed the warship upright and afloat after days of listing following its failed launch in late May. While the extent of the damage remains unclear, analysts say the vessel appears stable enough for inspection and transport. Jo Chun-ryong, a senior ruling party official, said North Korea would ensure 'the perfect restoration of the destroyer will be completed without fail' before the scheduled Workers' Party congress in late June — a deadline set by Kim. The 4,500-metric tonne destroyer was reportedly damaged during a launching ceremony, which Kim denounced as 'a criminal act caused by absolute carelessness, irresponsibility and unscientific empiricism.' At least four officials, including the deputy director of the Workers' Party's munitions industry, have been arrested. State media vowed those responsible would be 'held accountable for their unpardonable criminal act.' South Korean military spokesperson Lee Sung-joon said the North likely righted the warship earlier this week and was currently draining water and assessing internal damage. 'The nature and duration of the repair process will vary, depending on internal repairs, additional work or whether the incident affected the keel' he added, noting this might impact future deployment. The destroyer is North Korea's second of its class and part of Kim's broader push to modernise naval capabilities. The vessel is reportedly similar to one launched in April from Nampo, described by experts as the regime's most sophisticated warship to date, capable of deploying anti-air, anti-ship and nuclear-capable ballistic and cruise missiles. Though Pyongyang's naval forces lag behind regional rivals, analysts argue a modern destroyer would still enhance both offensive reach and defence. South Korean officials suspect Russian technical support played a role in the vessel's construction — a product of deepening military cooperation between Moscow and Pyongyang. Kim hosted Russian Security Council Secretary Sergei Shoigu in Pyongyang this week in another display of strengthening bilateral ties. Western officials have voiced concern that North Korea's supply of missiles, artillery and even troops to support Russia's war in Ukraine may be rewarded with advanced military technologies in return. Kim maintains that his military build-up is necessary to counter what he sees as hostile actions by the US and South Korea, who have stepped up joint exercises in response to North Korea's weapons development. The North Korean leader has stated that acquiring a nuclear-powered submarine is his next goal for bolstering naval strength. At least 10 Palestinians were killed in Israeli strikes in Gaza's southern city of Khan Younis overnight into Thursday, according to Nasser Hospital, which received the bodies. It was not immediately clear if the strikes were related to the recovery mission overnight of the bodies of two hostages. In Gaza City, three journalists were among five Palestinians who were killed in Israeli strikes on the courtyard of the al-Ahli Hospital in the north of the enclave. A half dozen others were injured in the attack, according to the Hamas-run Gaza Health Ministry. The Israeli military said it was looking into reports on the strike at al-Ahli and suggested that its officials may launch an investigation into the allegations. The army says it only targets militants and blames civilian deaths on Hamas because it is embedded in populated areas. Over 180 journalists and media workers have been killed since the start of Israel's military campaign, the vast majority of them in Gaza, according to the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists. Israel has said many of those killed in its strikes were militants 'posing as reporters'. The Palestinian Journalists Syndicate condemned what it described as Israel's continued systematic and deliberate targeting of journalists. In a statement, the union said that the ongoing Israeli aggression has so far claimed the lives of 225 journalists and media workers, including 30 female journalists. They've also identified the late journalists as Ismail Bdaih, Suleiman Hajjaj, and Samir Al-Rifai. The group has accused Israel of continuing a policy of 'enforced disappearance' against Palestinian journalists, citing the ongoing lack of information regarding the fate of two missing reporters — Nidal Al-Wahidi and Haitham Abdul-Wahed — whose cases the union described as 'clear instances of enforced disappearance in violation of international law.' Israel has come under fire recently for its targeting of journalists and conduct of war. Various global media houses and well known broadcasters have slammed Netanyahu's government for not allowing independent international media into Gaza to report and investigate. Israel says the decision to not allow journalists access into the enclave was for safety reasons, adding that they cannot ensure the safety of journalists once they've entered. Those claims were however dismissed, as various international media outlets have pledged to organise their own security protocol and arrangements. Various groups, including Reporters Without Borders, have accused Israel of attempting to control the narrative and silence the facts by not allowing free press inside Gaza to conduct their own research and show the conditions on the ground.
