SEOUL, Feb. 17 (Yonhap) -- About 70 judges held a rare meeting in Seoul on Friday in a sign of simmering protests over the recent dismissal of an outspoken judge who has gained national fame for openly ridiculing President Lee Myung-bak in a post on Facebook.

The judges held the closed-door meeting at the Seoul Central District Court to discuss issues related to job performance reviews by the Supreme Court.

They decided to submit a resolution to the head of the Seoul Central District Court that would call for transparency and objectivity in addition to judges' right to defense in a screening process for reappointment of judges.

Separately, 16 judges held a similar meeting at the Seoul Western District Court. Judges in regional district courts are also scheduled to hold similar meetings next week.

The rare development came a week after the Supreme Court concluded that Seo Ki-ho, a judge of the Seoul Northern District Court, was unfit to continue to sit on the bench due to exceptionally poor performance over the past decade.

Under South Korean law, judges have their job performance reviewed by the Supreme Court every 10 years, and those considered unfit for the job are eliminated.

It is highly unusual for an incumbent judge to fail to be reappointed by the top court in South Korea. Since the assessment system was adopted in 1988, only three judges have been branded as unqualified.

In December, Seo used derogatory expressions when talking about Lee in his Facebook and Twitter messages, as he denounced the government's crackdown on users of the social network services.

In the messages, Seo urged his SNS users "not to be intimidated" by the government's crackdown on such services, as it will cause "Gakha (his highness)" to "kick your ass." The slang he used in his messages came from the popular podcast "Naneun Ggomsuda (I am a petty trickster)," which is the country's first president-bashing lampoon.

His posts set off a debate over judges' obligation to stay neutral, prompting the top court to create SNS guidelines for judges.

Seo, whose term ends on Friday, has vowed to take legal action against the judiciary, such as filing a constitutional appeal in case the dismissal decision lacks reasonable grounds.