Special prosecution team defers indictment of former Minister Kim Wan-seop on suspicion of diversion of budget from the Presidential Office

Considering his status as a career civil servant at the time... Active participation not confirmed

(Seoul = Yonhap News) Reporter Lee Bal-eum and Choi Yun-seon = The 2nd comprehensive special prosecutor team, Kwon Chang-young, who is investigating the remaining suspicions after the 3rd special prosecutor, placed former Minister of Environment Kim Wan-seop on suspended indictment in connection with the suspicion of diverting the budget of the President's Office.

According to the legal community on the 21st, the special prosecutor's team suspended the indictment of former Minister Kim, who had been indicted and investigated on charges of abuse of power and obstruction of the exercise of rights the previous day, and also ended with a non-indictment of Daegu Mayor Choo Kyung-ho, who was the Minister of Strategy and Finance at the time.

Former Minister Kim served as the head of the budget office at the Ministry of Strategy and Finance, in charge of budget preparation and execution management, for about a year starting in June 2022, immediately after the inauguration of the Yoon Seok-yeol government.

The special prosecutor's team has been investigating allegations that 2.8 billion won worth of the Ministry of Public Administration and Security's budget was illegally diverted to pay construction costs to 21 Gram, an unqualified company, during the construction of the presidential residence relocation in 2022.

During the investigation, it was also confirmed that Yoon Jae-soon, the then Presidential Secretary for General Affairs, sent a text message to the Ministry of Public Administration and Security saying, “Reorganization of the Ministry of Strategy and Finance is complete.”

Based on these circumstances, the special investigation team suspected that the Ministry of Strategy and Finance, which manages and supervises budget preparation and execution, may have participated in or condoned budget diversion.

However, the special investigation team concluded that while the President's Office and the Ministry of Public Administration and Security actively intervened in budget diversion, the Ministry of Strategy and Finance only passively approved the budget.

Former Minister Kim Wan-seop judged that it was difficult to view this as active participation because he approved the budget as part of his duties as a career civil servant at the time.

It is said that there was no evidence that former Minister Kim's superior, Mayor Chu, intervened.

The special prosecutor's team previously sent to trial former Minister of Public Administration and Security Lee Sang-min, former Presidential Office Chief of Staff Kim Dae-ki, former General Secretary Yoon Jae-soon, and former Management Secretary Kim Oh-jin in connection with suspicions of budget diversion for relocating official residences.

First lady Kim Kun-hee, People Power Party lawmaker Yoon Han-hong, and 21 Gram CEO Kim Tae-young were indicted on charges of unfairly interfering in the official residence relocation process, and Board of Audit and Inspection member Yoo Byeong-ho and executives of the Board of Audit and Inspection were also indicted on charges of tampering with the Board of Audit and Inspection investigation.

Meanwhile, former Minister Kim's side said, "It appears that the approval of the related budget is a matter for the working level staff and that it has been taken into consideration that it does not explicitly violate the legal provisions stipulating the requirements for diversion."