The Democratic Party of Korea will form a dedicated team to respond to the "clinical trial approval lobbying allegations" involving Kim Seung-won, the nominee for Minister of the Ministry of Justice. As independent lawmaker Han Dong-hoon continues to raise allegations related to Kim, the party appears to have concluded it is difficult to stick to a no-response stance.
Park Sung-joon, the Democratic Party senior spokesperson, met with reporters at the National Assembly on the 7th after a closed supreme council meeting and said, "There were remarks that we should respond actively and swiftly regarding the nominee," adding, "The party needs to respond proactively to negative attacks against the nominee."
He continued, "The supreme council also voiced the need to respond regarding the confirmation hearing, so we formed a dedicated response team," adding, "Lawmakers Cho Kye-won, Han Min-soo, Jun Yong-gi, and Kim Dong-a joined the team, and they will respond actively to the negative attacks."
It is a complete shift from the previous response line for the Democratic Party to form a dedicated response team for Kim's confirmation hearing. Democratic Party leader Kim Min-seok said at the supreme council meeting on the 4th, "From now on, the party will not feel the need to answer to one lawmaker's challenges," signaling that it would not respond.
However, as Han continued to release additional recordings, the mood appears to have shifted even within the ruling party. Han also posted the call recording between Kim and a broker surnamed Yang on Facebook the day before.
Kim is facing allegations that in 2021, at Yang's request, the nominee lobbied Kim Kang-rip, then head of the Ministery of Food and Drug Safety, to approve clinical trials for a COVID-19 treatment. According to the call recording released by Han, Yang said during a call with the nominee at the time that the clinical trial approval "won't get past the director level," to which the nominee replied, "It's blocked at the director level? Got it."