The Citizens' Coalition for Economic Justice (CCEJ) said on the 10th that a special counsel team led by Min Joong-ki appears inevitably vulnerable to allegations of biased investigation for failing to take any investigative action even after securing testimony from former Unification Church World Headquarters chief Yoon Young-ho that politicians from the Democratic Party of Korea also received money and valuables.
CCEJ said, "While the special counsel team prepared a formal statement and conducted a compulsory investigation into People Power Party Rep. Kweon Seong-dong, even seeking an arrest consent motion, it only recorded matters related to Democratic Party of Korea figures in the form of an investigative report and did not carry out any compulsory investigation at all."
It added, "They left the testimony related to the Democratic Party of Korea only in the form of a simple investigative report, not a statement with legal effect," and "this can only be interpreted to mean they never planned to investigate directly from the start."
CCEJ also said the special counsel team's claim that suspicions of Unification Church money and valuables involving Democratic Party of Korea figures are not subject to investigation under the special counsel act is an unconvincing excuse, because the act specifies that "related criminal acts recognized during the course of the investigation" are also subject to investigation.
CCEJ said, "Given the same person (Yoon Young-ho), the same funds (Unification Church political funds), the same type of crime (violations of the Political Funds Act and the Improper Solicitation and Graft Act), and the same solicitation structure (a religious organization's lobbying of the political sphere), this clearly constitutes a related crime," adding, "If this is not a biased investigation, what is it?"
CCEJ said it "cannot be justified for any reason" that the special counsel team secured testimony in Aug. that Democratic Party of Korea figures received money and valuables but forwarded the case to police only the day before, four months later.
CCEJ said, "The suspicions about Unification Church political funds are no longer an issue for a particular party but have expanded into a problem across the political sphere, and everyone should be investigated by the same standards without exception."
It continued, "The special counsel team should clearly apologize for the biased investigation," and "we hope investigative agencies will proceed with an investigation without sanctuaries and without political calculation."