Statement posted on Facebook on Wednesday

'Park Seon-won's account shows cold medicine claim doesn't hold up'

'Why didn't he stop martial law if he had grounds months earlier?'

Independent lawmaker Han Dong-hoon speaks at a plenary session of the National Assembly in Yeouido, Seoul, on June 11. [Newsis]
Independent lawmaker Han Dong-hoon speaks at a plenary session of the National Assembly in Yeouido, Seoul, on June 11. [Newsis]

Independent lawmaker Han Dong-hoon on Wednesday urged Prime Minister Kim Min-seok, who is seeking to lead the Democratic Party of Korea, to explain why he did not participate in the National Assembly vote to lift martial law and what he was doing at the time. Han said the questions must be answered before the party's Aug. 17 leadership convention.

Han posted on his Facebook page that day, saying Kim appeared set to join "the Democratic Party's unprincipled infighting" at the convention. "These are questions I have already asked but never received answers to," he said.

Han said Kim has still not given a truthful account of where he was and what he was doing on the night of Dec. 3, 2024, when he did not take part in the Assembly vote to lift martial law. "Kim said he took cold medicine and fell asleep and was unaware of what was happening, but Democratic Party lawmaker Park Seon-won said on Kim Eui-jun's YouTube broadcast that he had briefed then-senior supreme council member Kim Min-seok just before President Yoon Suk Yeol's address that night — which suggests Kim's account is not true," Han said.

Han went on to say he was citing what Park had said on Kim Eui-jun's YouTube broadcast on Dec. 12, 2024.

According to Han's account, Park said his aide told him Yoon was about to issue a strongly worded statement condemning the National Assembly for blocking the budget; Park then called Kim Min-seok and suggested they launch a preemptive attack, saying "they're pulling this stunt in the dead of night — let's come out first and say it's absurd"; and shortly afterward, his aide called back to say, "It's emergency martial law. Get out of there, sir."

Han also posed a second question, asking why Kim — who had said months before the martial law declaration that he had grounds to believe martial law was coming — never made those grounds public to prevent it. "I had demanded at the time that he disclose the grounds. He still has not answered what those grounds were," Han said.


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