DUP to politicize Korea-Japan pact

DUP to politicize Korea-Japan pact

Lee Hae-chan, left, chairman of the main opposition Democratic United Party, shakes hands with Kang Ki-kab, the new chairman of the minor Unified Progressive Party, at the National Assembly, Monday. Kang paid a courtesy visit to Lee after being elected the new leader of the minority party. / Yonhap By Chung Min-uck The main opposition Democratic United Party (DUP) is politicizing the stalled defense agreement between Seoul and Tokyo ahead of the crucial Dec. 19 presidential election, urging the dismissal of the Prime Minister to take responsibility for mishandling the controversial pact. “It is regrettable that President Lee Myung-bak is not yet ready to respond to our call for the dismissal of Prime Minister Kim Hwang-sik (over a bid to secretly pass the Korea-Japan intelligence-protection pact),” said Rep. Lee Hae-chan, the DUP Chairman, during a supreme council meeting, Monday. “We will hold a non-confidence vote on Kim on Tuesday at the National Assembly... it would be better for President Lee to voluntarily dismiss Kim before the National Assembly takes action.” Earlier, the government came under fire for approving the Korea-Japan agreement on protecting classified military information, generally known as the General Security of Military Information Act (GSOMIA), in a swift manner during the June 26 Cabinet meeting without issuing any notice to the public or conducting a proper discussion on the matter in parliament. Prime Minister Kim officially apologized for the procedural flaws in the wake of the pact’s pullback on June 29. However, since then, main opposition party lawmakers have continuously urged the resignation of Prime Minister Kim and Foreign Minister Kim Sung-hwan, as well as pushed to scrap the defense pact with the former colonial ruler, riding on worsening anti-Japanese opinion here. Public sentiment against Japan hit rock bottom recently following Tokyo’s move to increase its self-defense capabilities, together with lingering historic animosity stemming from Japan’s 1910-1945 colonial rule of the peninsula. Against this backdrop, Kim Tae-hyo, senior presidential secretary for national security strategy, resigned for masterminding the process, and Cho Sei-young, director-general of the foreign ministry’s Northeast Asian affairs bureau, was also replaced. Despite this the Lee administration indicated their intention to push ahead with the agreement arguing it would more effectively help to deter North Korea’s provocation. “(The Korea-Japan military pact) is a good item for the opposition parties to politicize,” said Shin Yul, a political science professor at Myongji University in Seoul. “More than anything the government pushed for the pact without gaining public consensus which could be said is totally against the basis of democracy. The other thing is that the pact is with Japan. Anti-Japanese sentiment prevails here irrespective of whether voters lean to the right or to the left.” Regarding the non-confidence vote over the Prime Minister, Shin said, support from the ruling Saenuri Party would be needed for the dismissal to actually take place because it holds the majority (150) seats in the 300-member Assembly. Meanwhile, the governing party, while criticizing the procedural lapses by the government in line with the DUP, is taking a step back to assess the effectiveness of the deal in fear of further public backlash ahead of the pivotal presidential election. Prime Minister Kim is to attend a parliamentary interpellation session on Wednesday.

muchung@koreatimes.co.kr