The Korea Times (Korean: 코리아타임스) is the oldest daily English-language newspaper in South Korea. It is a sister paper of the Hankook Ilbo,a major Korean language daily;both are owned by Dongwha Enterprise,a wood-based manufacturer. Since the late 1950s,it had been published by the Hankook Ilbo Media Group,but following an embezzlement scandal in 2013–2014 it was sold to Dongwha Group,which also acquired Hankook Ilbo. The president-publisher of The Korea Times is Oh Young-jin.
The National Intelligence Service is the chief intelligence agency of South Korea. The agency was officially established in 1961 as the Korean Central Intelligence Agency,during the rule of general Park Chung Hee's military Supreme Council for National Reconstruction,which displaced the Second Republic of Korea. The original duties of the KCIA were to supervise and coordinate both international and domestic intelligence activities and criminal investigations by all government intelligence agencies,including that of the military. The agency's broad powers allowed it to actively intervene in politics. Agents undergo years of training and checks before they are officially inducted and receive their first assignments.
Lee Kun-hee was a South Korean business magnate who served as the chairman of Samsung Group from 1987 to 2008,and again from 2010 until his death in 2020. He is also credited with the transformation of Samsung to one of the world's largest business entities that engages in semiconductors,smartphones,electronics,shipbuilding,construction,and other businesses. Since Lee Kun-hee became the chairman of Samsung,the company became the world's largest manufacturer of smartphones,memory chips,and appliances. He was the third son of Samsung founder Lee Byung-chul. With an estimated net worth of US$21 billion at the time of his death,he was the richest person in South Korea,a position that he had held since 2007.
Chung Mong-koo is a South Korean businessman. He is the honorary chairman and former CEO of Hyundai Motor Group,Korea's second largest chaebol that manages 54 subsidiaries including Hyundai Motor,Kia Motors,and Hyundai Steel. He started his career in 1970,joining the engineering &construction division of the group. Chung succeeded his father,Chung Ju-yung,the founder of the conglomerate known as the Hyundai Group. When the conglomerate split into several parts in 1999,Chung Mong-koo took over the Hyundai Motor division. He is the eldest surviving son of Chung Ju-yung's eight sons.
Lee Myung-bak often referred to by his initials MB,is a South Korean businessman and former politician who served as the 10th president of South Korea from 2008 to 2013. Before his presidency,he was the CEO of Hyundai Engineering and Construction,and the mayor of Seoul from 2002 to 2006.
Presidential elections were held in South Korea on 19 December 2007. The election was won by Lee Myung-bak of the Grand National Party,returning conservatives to the Blue House for the first time in ten years. Lee defeated Grand Unified Democratic New Party nominee Chung Dong-young and independent Lee Hoi-chang by a nearly 2-to-1 margin,the largest since direct elections were reintroduced in 1987. It also marked the first time a president-elect in Korea was under investigation by a prosecutor. Voter turnout was 63.0%,an all-time low according to the National Election Commission.
The Supreme Prosecutors' Office of the Republic of Korea (SPO) is a governmental prosecutor organization in South Korea and is run under the Ministry of Justice. As a national representative of prosecutors,the Office works with the Supreme Court of Korea and below.
The Lee Myung-bak government was the fifth government of the Sixth Republic of South Korea. It took office on 25 February 2008 after Lee Myung-bak's victory in the 2007 presidential elections. Most of the new cabinet was approved by the National Assembly on 29 February. Led by President Lee Myung-bak,it was supported principally by the conservative Saenuri Party,previously known as the Grand National Party. It was also known as Silyong Jeongbu,the "pragmatic government",a name deriving from Lee's campaign slogan.
Lee Sang-don is a South Korean legal scholar and a conservative liberal political activist. His liberal philosophy was influenced by American conservatism and neoconservatism,but he is critical of South Korean conservatism. He currently works as a professor at Chung-Ang University. He is a conservative pundit well known for expressing criticisms towards the Lee Myung-bak government. He received criticisms from a group of pro-Lee Myung-bak lawmakers for participating in the restructure of the Saenuri Party in the past due to his distance with Lee Myung-bak.
The 2008 Grand National Party Convention is a political scandal in the South Korean politics that exposed higher-level political corruption within the ranks of the Lee Myung-bak government. The connections surrounding the Lee Myung-bak government has also affected the performance of the Grand National Party. A GNP lawmaker,Koh Seung-duk,was instrumental of exposing it by reporting his knowledge about the corruption incident to the Seoul Central District Prosecutors’Office.
The MOFAT Diamond Scandal involves a senior government official of South Korea allegedly engaging in insider trading and stock-price rigging in coordination with CNK International,which is a mining company that won the mining rights of a diamond mine in Cameroon.
The South Korean illegal surveillance incident was alleged to have occurred in 2010 when the Civil Service Ethics Division (공직윤리지원관실) under the Prime Minister's Office of South Korea inspected a civilian,a political action that is illegal under the South Korean conventions. The incident re-emerged in early 2012 as the election approached.
The 2012 NIS public opinion manipulation scandal saw members of the National Intelligence Service (NIS) of South Korea accused of interfering in the South Korean presidential election,2012. First,an agent of the National Intelligence Service (NIS) was alleged to have manipulated public opinion to help Park Geun-hye's presidential election under the command of the NIS. Second,the director of the agency commanded an NIS agent to manipulate public opinion. Suspicions were raised before the election,but were not verified until afterwards.
Lee Jae-yong,known professionally in the West as Jay Y. Lee,is a South Korean business magnate and convicted felon who has been serving as the executive chairman of Samsung Electronics since October 2022. He is the only son of Lee Kun-hee and Hong Ra-hee. As of September 2021,Lee has an estimated net worth of US$11 billion,making him the fourth-wealthiest person in South Korea. In January 2021,Lee was sidelined from taking part in major Samsung business dealings after he resumed serving a prison sentence for his bribery and embezzlement convictions. He was pardoned in August 2022,before reinstating his position at Samsung.
Choi Soon-sil is a South Korean businesswoman known primarily for her involvement in the 2016 South Korean political scandal,stemming from her influence over the 11th President of South Korea,Park Geun-hye. In 2018,a court sentenced Choi to 20 years in prison on corruption charges. Due to Choi's concurrent involvement in her father's religious cult,reporting media have called her "South Korea's Rasputin",in reference to Russian mystic Grigori Rasputin.
The 2016 South Korean political scandal,often called Park Geun-hye–Choi Soon-sil Gate in South Korea,was a scandal that emerged around October 2016 in relation to the unusual access that Choi Soon-sil,the daughter of shaman-esque cult leader Choi Tae-min,had to President Park Geun-hye of South Korea.
The impeachment of Park Geun-hye,President of South Korea,was the culmination of a political scandal involving interventions to the presidency from her aide,Choi Soon-sil. The impeachment vote took place on 9 December 2016,with 234 members of the 300-member National Assembly voting in favour of the impeachment and temporary suspension of Park Geun-hye's presidential powers and duties. This exceeded the required two-thirds threshold in the National Assembly and,although the vote was by secret ballot,the results indicated that more than half of the 128 lawmakers in Park's party Saenuri had supported her impeachment. Thus,Hwang Kyo-ahn,then Prime Minister of South Korea,became Acting President while the Constitutional Court of Korea was due to determine whether to accept the impeachment. The court upheld the impeachment in a unanimous 8–0 decision on 10 March 2017,removing Park from office. The regularly scheduled presidential election was advanced to 9 May 2017,and Moon Jae-in,former leader of the Democratic Party,was elected as Park's permanent successor.
The Burning Sun scandal,also known as Burning Sun gate,was a 2019 entertainment and sex scandal in Seoul,South Korea,which involved several celebrities,including Korean idols of popular K-pop groups,and police officials. It was the largest scandal to hit the K-pop industry. The allegations of sex crimes added to the country's "epidemic" of what is called molka,a Korean word for the online distribution of unconsented sex videos taken of women,and the scandal became fodder for political parties,who argued over how to handle it.
Yoon Suk Yeol is a South Korean politician who has been serving as the 13th and current President of South Korea since 2022. Prior to his presidency,he served as the prosecutor general of South Korea between 2019 and 2021.
Han Dong-hoon is the 69th Minister of Justice of the Republic of Korea,serving in the administration of President Yoon Suk-yeol. Han previously served as a junior anti-corruption prosecutor and played a leading role in multiple high-profile cases,including those involving Samsung executive Lee Jae-yong,former Presidents Park Geun-hye and Lee Myung-bak,and family members of former Minister of Justice Cho Kuk. Considered a protégéand close associate of Yoon,Han served as a principal deputy when the president held senior positions in the Korean prosecution service.
