A pro-North Korean paper published in Japan said Friday that the scandal surrounding a South Korean leftist lawmaker has been created by Seoul's spy agency to deflect attention from its meddling in last year's presidential race.
In an article titled "The revival of the treason conspiracy law," the Chosun Sinbo blasted the legal actions taken by the National Intelligence Service (NIS) as a concerted move to persecute progressives. The official paper of the General Association of Korean Residents in Japan, picked up in Seoul, also said that actions taken against Unified Progressive Party lawmaker Lee Seok-ki are a shallow attempt to bail out the NIS that had been facing the worst crisis situation in its history.
Lee and three members of a so-called Revolutionary Organization are under arrest and will be put on trial. Transcripts of a gathering held earlier in the year showed Lee allegedly plotting to blow up key infrastructure with explosives and weapons in case war broke out with the North. The meeting took place when tensions were running high, and the North threatened to attack both South Korea and the United States with nuclear weapons.
The intelligence service has been accused of using agents to post comments on Internet communities prior to last year's presidential election that may have influenced voters. Its former director is facing trial for ordering such unlawful activities that critics say favored conservative candidate Park Geun-hye, who won the Dec. 19 poll. The NIS has maintained that it did not influence the elections in any way and its agents were only engaged in counter-espionage and trying to block North Korean cyber attack specialists with access to South Korean online communities from spreading lies with the aim of influencing voters ahead of the critical poll.
The paper then said that the uproar generated by Lee was the work of President Park's new chief of staff, Kim Ki-choon, and other hard-line conservatives in Seoul.
It said that such hostile actions cannot coexist with better inter-Korean relations.
The report by the paper is noteworthy because North Korean media outlets have remained strangely silent on allegations raised against Lee who was imprisoned in the past for pro-North Korean activities.
North Korean watchers said the Chosun Sinbo report may reflect how Pyongyang actually views the treason case, as they do not want to express their opinions for fear such a move can jeopardize thawing cross-border relations. (Yonhap News)
