SEOUL, Dec. 10 (Yonhap) -- A former close aide to President Park Geun-hye appeared before prosecutors Wednesday to face questioning over suspicions that he had meddled in state affairs behind the scenes.
Jeong Yun-hoe, who served as an adviser for Park when she was a lawmaker, is alleged to have held regular meetings with several senior presidential officials and sought to collude with them to replace Chief of Staff Kim Ki-choon, according to a presidential document leaked to the media. He has never held any official position in the current administration.
Dismissing the document dated Jan. 6 as groundless, Jeong last week filed a libel suit against the local daily Segye Times, which first reported the allegations.
Accompanied by his lawyer, Jeong entered the Seoul District Prosecutors' Office in southern Seoul at around 9:50 a.m.
Jeong Yun-hoe (C) answers questions from reporters before entering Seoul District Prosecutors' Office in southern Seoul on Dec. 10, 2014, to face questioning over a document leak. (Yonhap)
"It will be all revealed who pulled this kind of huge fire prank," Jeong told reporters before entering the prosecution office.
It marks the first time for Jeong, who had remained behind the curtain, to appear before the public.
Asked whether he had a phone call with President Park, Jeong shortly said, "No."
Jeong also flatly denied the allegation that he had interfered with the appointment of a culture minister.
Jeong also flatly denied the allegation that he had interfered with the appointment of a culture minister.
Jeong filed a libel suit against the Segye Times while the main opposition New Politics Alliance for Democracy filed a criminal complaint against him with the prosecution for allegedly interfering in state affairs.
Jeong is also the person a Japanese daily cited as the person rumored to have been with President Park on the day of April's deadly ferry sinking.
Tatsuya Kato, the former head of the Seoul bureau of Japan's conservative Sankei Shimbun newspaper, is currently standing trial on defamation charges.
Kato wrote in an article that Park and Jeong had an alleged secret meeting on April 16 when the Sewol ferry sank off the southwest coast, killing more than 300 people, mostly high school students on a school trip.
Since launching the investigation, the prosecution office has summoned several people implicated in the scandal for questioning.
Park Kwan-cheon, a senior police officer suspected of drawing up the document, was summoned twice for questioning.
The 48-year-old police superintendent had worked for the presidential office Cheong Wa Dae until early February, when he was transferred to a police station in northern Seoul.
The prosecution also called an informant, who had tipped off Park about the secret meeting, earlier in the day for questioning.
The informant formerly headed a regional tax office and is well acquainted with ranking Cheong Wa Dae officials and secretaries.
Two incumbent police officers, including a lieutenant surnamed Choi, were detained Tuesday for allegedly copying the document, and handing it over to a Hanwha Group employee who eventually allegedly leaked it to the media.
The prosecution office said it will summon Segye Times reporters for questioning next week.
The allegations over his behind-the-scenes intervention in state affairs have emerged as a nation-rocking political scandal, putting the Park administration in the hot seat as it enters its third year in power in late February.
Not much information is known about Jeong apart from that he was a key adviser to the president from 1996-2004. He is also the son-in-law of late pastor Choi Tae-min, who had a close relationship with the president.
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