President Moon Appoints Park Beom-kye as Justice Minister, 27th Appointment Without Consent from the Opposition Party

[경향신문]

Justice Minister nominee Park Beom-kye answers a question. Yonhap News

On January 27, President Moon Jae-in approved the appointment of justice minister nominee Park Beom-kye (pictured). Cheongwadae spokesperson Kang Min-seok announced that Park would begin serving as justice minister on January 28. Minister Park became the 27th ministerial nominee to be appointed without the consent of the opposition party. Justice Minister Choo Mi-ae will step down after serving for a year and a month.

This day, the Democratic Party of Korea held a plenary session of the Legislation and Judiciary Committee at the National Assembly and adopted the confirmation hearing report on Minister Park. The meeting was adjourned after passing the report in just two minutes. The People Power Party refused to attend the meeting opposing the report. The confirmation hearing report was adopted after President Moon set the deadline to January 27 the previous day and made another request to the National Assembly to submit the report on Minister Park. According to the Personnel Hearing Act, the National Assembly should have completed the confirmation hearing procedure including the adoption of the report by January 25. But the Legislation and Judiciary Committee failed to reach a conclusion despite conducting the confirmation hearing for over thirteen hours on January 25. The opposition party insisted that Park was inappropriate for justice minister. This day, lawmaker Kim Do-eup, the People Power Party secretary for the Legislation and Judiciary Committee said, “The ruling party notified that they would pass the report on their own. There is no reason to attend (the plenary session).”

Justice Minister Choo Mi-ae officially leaves the office on January 27 and waves as she heads out of the justice ministry building at the government complex in Gwacheon. Kim Young-min

When Justice Minister Choo Mi-ae officially left her office at the Justice Ministry in the government complex in Gwacheon this afternoon, she said, “All reforms are bound to face resistance. There may be eternal reforms, but there is no eternal resistance.” She also said, “I express my deep gratitude to President Moon, who trusted me with reforms in the Prosecution Service and who did not spare his support, and to the dedication and efforts of former justice ministers Park Sang-ki and Cho Kuk, who suffered all kinds of hardships to play the role of priming water for reforms in the Prosecution Service.” Minister Choo mentioned the launch of the Corruption Investigation Office for High-level Officials, adjustments to the investigative authority of the police and the Prosecution Service, and the strengthening of the criminal trial department as the fruits of her term in office and said, “We must complete reforms in the Prosecution Service, including a complete separation of the authority to investigate and to prosecute a case. We must correct the authority of the Prosecution Service, which has become deformed and too big over the past seventy years, and restore the criminal and judicial system to a normal state.”