South Korean prosecutors demanded a two-year prison sentence for Lee Jae-myung

Lee Jae-myung, leader of South Korea’s largest opposition party, the Democratic Party of Korea, attended the last trial of his second trial on suspicion of violating the Public Office Election Act on the 26th. The prosecutors demanded a two-year prison sentence for him in court.

The prosecutors accused Lee Jae-myung of lying to the media during his campaign for the South Korean presidency in December 2021 that he did not know Kim Moon-ki, director of the First Development Department of Seongnam Urban Development Corporation. Kim Moon-ki died while under investigation for a corruption case involving a real estate development project in Seongnam City. During the promotion of the real estate project involved, Lee Jae-myung served as mayor of Seongnam City. The prosecutors also accused him of making false statements about land use planning issues related to another real estate development project during the National Assembly’s review of the Gyeonggi Provincial Government in October 2021.

The Seoul Central District Court found in the first instance in November last year that Lee Jae-myung had violated the Public Office Election Act by lying as a presidential candidate and sentenced him to one year in prison with a two-year suspended sentence. Lee Jae-myung subsequently appealed.
In the appeal hearing held at the Seoul High Court on the 26th, the prosecutors proposed that Lee Jae-myung “lied and misled voters” and should be “severely punished”, and asked the judge to sentence him to two years in prison. The court plans to make a second-instance ruling on March 26.

President Yoon Seok-yeol of the ruling People’s Power Party of South Korea was impeached by the National Assembly for the martial law storm in December last year and was charged with “civil sedition”. The Constitutional Court of South Korea held the last debate on Yoon Seok-yeol’s impeachment case on the 25th of this month and is expected to make a ruling in mid-March. If the Constitutional Court supports the impeachment, Yoon Seok-yeol will be formally removed from the presidency, and South Korea must hold a new presidential election within 60 days. Lee Jae-myung was previously regarded as the next popular presidential candidate.

Lee Jae-myung’s current case may hinder his candidacy. If Lee Jae-myung is convicted in the final trial of the case, he may not be allowed to run for public office for several years.