Rights watchdog to probe alleged surveillance by baseball club

South Korea's human rights watchdog said Friday it will investigate charges of illegal surveillance involving a professional baseball club.
   
An official with the National Human Rights Commission of Korea said the watchdog will start looking into allegations that Choi Ha-jin, former president of the Lotte Giants baseball club, reviewed closed-circuit television (CCTV) footage of hotels where the team stayed on road trips to inspect his players.
  
"We haven't received a formal petition to investigate this particular case," the official said. "But we concluded that this was a matter of grave concern and decided to launch an investigation on our own."
   
The official said the commission will ask the Giants to present more documents necessary to verify the surveillance allegations, which were first raised in a media report.
   
Choi resigned from his post Thursday. He acknowledged that he had asked team officials to secure footage from CCTV installed at lobbies of team hotels, but said he had first asked them to let his players know beforehand that they would be monitored.
  
Also on Thursday, another figure in the controversy, Bae Jae-hoo, resigned as the Giants' general manager.
  
The Giants on Friday named the new president and the general manager.
   
Lotte Group said Lee Chang-won, its former head of public relations with more than a decade of experience in external communication, will replace Choi as the Giants' president. 
  
The group also said Lee Yoon-won, ex-director of administration and planning at Lotte Foods, will take over as the new general manager. Lotte said Lee Yoon-won oversaw operations of the ball club in the group's policy headquarters for about 10 years, before joining Lotte Foods in 2010. (Yonhap)