SEOUL, South Korea — South Korean President Lee Jae Myung nominated a five-term liberal lawmaker as protection minister Monday, breaking with a convention of appointing retired army generals.
The announcement got here as a number of outstanding former protection officers, together with ex-Protection Minister Kim Yong Hyun, face high-profile legal trials over their roles in sporting out martial legislation closing 12 months below then-President Yoon Suk Yeol, who was once indicted on rebel fees and got rid of from workplace.
Ahn Gyu-back, a lawmaker from Lee’s Democratic Birthday party, has served at the Nationwide Meeting’s protection committee and chaired a legislative panel that investigated the cases surrounding Yoon’s martial legislation decree.
Yoon’s authoritarian transfer concerned deploying masses of closely armed troops to the Nationwide Meeting and election fee places of work in what prosecutors described as an unlawful try to close down the legislature and arrest political fighters and election officers.
That sparked calls to improve civilian keep an eye on over the army, and Lee promised all through his election marketing campaign to nominate a protection minister with a civilian background.
Since a 1961 coup that introduced army dictator Park Chung-hee to energy, all of South Korea’s protection ministers have come from the army — a development that persisted even after the rustic’s democratization within the past due Eighties.
Whilst Ahn will face a legislative listening to, the method could be a formality, because the Democrats dangle a relaxed majority within the Nationwide Meeting and legislative consent isn’t required for Lee to nominate him. Amongst Cupboard appointments, Lee simplest wishes legislative consent for top minister, Seoul’s nominal No. 2 process.
“As the primary civilian Minister of Nationwide Protection in 64 years, he’ll be answerable for main and overseeing the transformation of the army after its mobilization in martial legislation,” Kang Hoon-sik, Lee’s leader of personnel, stated in a briefing.
Ahn was once amongst 11 ministers nominated by way of Lee on Monday, with longtime diplomat Cho Hyun decided on as international minister and five-term lawmaker Chung Dong-young returning for any other stint as unification minister — a place he held from 2004 to 2005 as Seoul’s level guy for family members with North Korea.
