'Arrest Warrants Requested for 3 Ministry of Industry Officials Over Obstruction of Wolseong Nuclear Power Plant Audit'

Allegations of Damage to Public Electronic Records and Violations of the Board of Audit and Inspection Act

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[Asia Economy Reporter Yoo Byung-don] The prosecution has requested arrest warrants for Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy officials involved in the mass deletion of internal data related to the Wolseong Unit 1 nuclear power plant.

The Criminal Division 5 of Daejeon District Prosecutors' Office (Chief Prosecutor Lee Sang-hyun), investigating allegations of manipulation in the economic feasibility evaluation of Wolseong Unit 1 and related complaints, requested the Daejeon District Court on the 2nd to issue arrest warrants for three Ministry officials at the director and section chief level, including Mr. A (53), who are accused of damaging public electronic records and violating the Board of Audit and Inspection Act.

According to the prosecution, Mr. A and others are suspected of ordering or tacitly allowing the deletion of data related to Wolseong Unit 1 around November last year, just before the Board of Audit and Inspection requested the submission of materials.

In fact, Mr. B, a subordinate of Mr. A, reportedly entered the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy office at the Government Sejong Complex around 11 p.m. on the previous day and deleted 444 items of data related to Wolseong Unit 1 for about two hours on the morning of December 2, when a meeting with an auditor from the Board of Audit and Inspection was scheduled, according to the Board of Audit and Inspection and others.

At that time, Mr. B reportedly modified file names and other details to make the original content unrecognizable even if restored later for documents deemed important, and later, judging that there was too much data, simply deleted files or removed entire folders.

Mr. B told the Board of Audit and Inspection, "I thought they might feel uneasy if I told them there were audit-related materials but they were missing," and "My section chief told me it would be better to delete the data over the weekend, so I did it late at night in a hurry," according to reports.

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