Professor Im Miri: "'Taeum' Is Not Authority, It's Truly Disgusting"... Fierce Criticism of Yoon Seok-yeol's Order for Investigation of Choo

Minister of Justice Choo Mi-ae attended the plenary meeting of the Legislation and Judiciary Committee held at the National Assembly on the 5th and presented the proposed budget for the next year. Photo by Asia Economy

[Asia Economy Reporter Hana Na] Professor Im Miri, a research professor at Korea University’s Institute of Korean History, fiercely criticized Justice Minister Choo Mi-ae’s order to inspect Prosecutor General Yoon Seok-yeol’s special activity expenses, calling it "truly despicable."

On the 7th, Professor Im shared a link to an article titled "Choo Mi-ae Orders Investigation of Yoon Seok-yeol’s Special Activity Expenses" on her Facebook and made this statement.

Professor Im pointed out, "The authority granted by the Constitution and the people to the president is the power over public official personnel appointments, not the authority to 'bully' through proxies."

A netizen who saw the post commented, "Should both resign even after this? It’s clear who is at fault," adding, "No matter what happens, Prosecutor General Yoon must endure for the country. So please stop saying discouraging things. Yoon is not enduring because he likes it. They may enjoy tormenting him, but..."

In response, Professor Im said, "Resignation and dismissal are different. Dismissal is an exercise of the president’s personnel authority and carries political responsibility," adding, "On the other hand, resignation is initiated by Prosecutor General Yoon himself, so it’s about pressuring him to resign without dismissal. Since the Cho Kuk incident last year, I have said through my Kyunghyang columns that it would be better to dismiss him, and I still think the same. I have never said that Prosecutor General Yoon should resign."

The netizen replied, "Dismissal is the proper personnel authority to remove the party at fault. If you have personnel authority, is it justifiable to dismiss a prosecutor general with a guaranteed term because he investigates your allies?" and asked, "Is it your wish to block government investigations through such dismissal and have someone like Lee Sung-yoon become prosecutor general?"

Professor Im responded, "That is a valid point, but I think it is difficult to expect that from the current Moon Jae-in administration."

Meanwhile, on the 6th, Justice Minister Choo Mi-ae instructed the Inspection Department of the Supreme Prosecutors’ Office to investigate the payment and allocation details of special activity expenses at the Supreme Prosecutors’ Office and various prosecution offices, according to a Ministry of Justice announcement.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.