Ahn Cheol-soo on Prosecutor-Centric Personnel Controversy: "Yoon Must Have Worried Too... No Need to Worry"

[Image source=Yonhap News]

[Asia Economy Reporter Ki-min Lee] Ahn Cheol-soo, a member of the People Power Party who served as the chairman of the 20th Presidential Transition Committee, said on the 8th that "personnel matters are entirely the authority of the appointing power" in response to the controversy over the Yoon Seok-yeol administration's personnel appointments heavily skewed toward the prosecution.

On the same day, Ahn met with reporters at the Yongsan Presidential Office building and responded this way when asked about President Yoon's concentration of former prosecutors in key positions.

He added, "(President Yoon) clearly knows the strengths and weaknesses of the people he knows best, what they can do, and what their limitations are, so he must have given a lot of thought to those aspects."

He continued, "Since I am not affiliated with the Blue House (Presidential Office), I am not in a position to give an immediate answer on that issue," and emphasized, "It has only been a few days since the election ended, so I think more understanding is needed, but I don't think it is something to worry about that much."

Ahn visited the Yongsan Presidential Office building for a briefing related to the white paper titled 'Humbly Upholding the Will of the People,' which he published in his capacity as the chairman of the transition committee.

The day before, he met President Yoon at the Yongsan office and personally delivered the white paper. Ahn said, "I sincerely thank the members who devoted themselves without a single day off during the 50 days of the transition committee to embody the spirit of the times into national tasks," and explained, "This white paper is different from previous ones in that it is photo-centric to make the new government's national vision easier to understand."

He added, "It started from the fundamental idea that the national budget should be spent for the people and should contribute to national development."

The approximately 470-page white paper, released the day before, will be distributed to various public institutions, universities, and public libraries. The full text will be posted in e-book format on the Republic of Korea's 'Policy Briefing' website and the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism's 'Gonggam' website, making it accessible to all citizens.

Ahn said, "It was created with the philosophy that it should not be a mere formality wasting taxpayers' money but must gain the sympathy of many citizens to become a driving force for reform."

Heo Seong-woo, Secretary for Public Proposals at the Presidential Office and chairman of the white paper compilation committee, said, "We printed a total of 12,500 copies, and while in the past it was distributed to the top 300 companies, this time we increased distribution to the top 500 companies and also distributed to small and medium-sized enterprises."

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