Foreign Ministry receives lowest grade in anti-corruption commission’s evaluation


The Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade is tightening discipline for overseas diplomats in the wake of a stock-rigging scandal involving its energy envoy.

The Foreign Ministry on Thursday said it recently summoned a consul general from Wuhan in central China over opaque accounting practices. The ministry has been internally auditing the case after the diplomat was found to have used the Consulate General’s budget in an inappropriate manner, it said.

The consul general was referred to a central disciplinary committee, the ministry said, although he did not embezzle taxpayers’ money.

It is unprecedented for the ministry to summon a consul general for accounting malpractice.

The ministry’s action came in response to allegations that suspended senior diplomat Kim Eun-seok, who was in charge of energy and resource diplomacy, intentionally published an overblown press release in December 2010 to drive up the stock price of CNK International in connection with its winning of diamond mining rights in Cameroon.

State watchdog the Board of Audit and Inspection asked the ministry to sack the energy envoy, who is also suspected of telling his relatives about the CNK information prior to the ministry’s distribution of the press release.

Earlier in the morning, Foreign Minister Kim Sung-hwan told a radio program he felt so embarrassed that he wanted to disappear.

“As the leader of the entire ministry, I am continuously searching for the most appropriate answer to take full responsibility,” Kim said.

The Foreign Ministry’s discipline has been repeatedly criticized in recent years.

In late 2010, several Korean diplomats at the consulate in Shanghai were accused of having extramarital affairs with a Chinese woman and leaking significant government information to her.

Although a government probe later found that the information did not include state secrets, the ministry was heavily criticized for dishonoring the nation.

A few months before the Shanghai scandal, former Foreign Minister Yu Myung-hwan stepped down from his post after it was revealed that his daughter received special favor in landing a job at the ministry.

In January, the Foreign Ministry received the lowest grade for the third consecutive year in the presidential Anti-Corruption and Civil Rights Commission’s evaluation on the government offices’ anti-corruption prevention efforts.

By Kim Yoon-mi (yoonmi@heraldcorp.com)