Ruling and opposition parties trade barbs over speaking-rights suspension; Financial Services Commission audit tackles AI hacking, leveraged ETFs
![People Power Party Rep. Park Hyung-soo, who leads his party's side on the Legislation and Judiciary Committee, protests the conduct of committee chair Rep. Seo Young-gyo of the Democratic Party of Korea during the national audit of the Ministry of Justice and the Korea Legal Aid Corporation at the National Assembly on Thursday. [Yonhap]](https://wimg.heraldcorp.com/news/cms/2026/10/08/news-p.v1.20261008.5e7bed9fdeb34eff89693106775753bb_P1.jpg)
Ruling and opposition lawmakers clashed sharply at the National Assembly's Legislation and Judiciary Committee national audit on Thursday — the third day of this year's audit season — over a remark by People Power Party Rep. Kim Tae-gyu involving an "owl rock" reference and the subsequent suspension of his speaking rights by committee chair Rep. Seo Young-gyo of the Democratic Party of Korea.
Pro-government Democratic Party lawmakers accused Kim of "begging for donations by boosting YouTube Shorts view counts," while the People Power Party fired back that Seo's decision to cut off Kim's microphone was unfair.
Park Hyung-soo, who leads the People Power Party's side on the committee, raised the issue moments after the audit of the Ministry of Justice got under way, saying Seo "must clearly apologize and pledge that this will never happen again."
Park argued that Kim had not been the one to start the exchange. "It was Rep. Park Eun-jeong of the Rebuilding Korea Party who first said 'act like a human being,' and Rep. Kim Yong-min of the Democratic Party followed up by saying 'you have never once been human,'" he said.
Fellow People Power Party Rep. Kwak Gyu-taek also defended Kim, using a dinner analogy. "Eighteen people sat down for a meal and ordered 18 portions of meat — everyone should eat one portion each," he said. "One person ate six portions. How can you run a meeting like that?"
Kim himself pushed back as well. "'You are not human' and 'act like a human being' — is there really such a big difference?" he said. "If someone else had heard those words and felt hurt, do you think they would have just stayed quiet?"
Democratic Party members on the committee, however, demanded that Kim apologize first, before any apology from Seo.
Rep. Kim Yong-min said Kim Tae-gyu's remarks amounted to mockery of the deceased. "This is fundamentally different," he said. "Is he boosting YouTube Shorts views to beg for donations? Rep. Kim has no right to sit in that seat and no right to speak."
The Democratic Party used the session to highlight what it called the completion of prosecutorial reform, urging the newly launched Public Prosecution Service — which began operations Friday — to make appropriate use of its authority to request supplementary investigations. The People Power Party, meanwhile, said the agency's launch under an acting-director system, combined with the abolition of direct investigative powers, had created a public-safety vacuum.
The National Policy Committee, another flashpoint in this year's audit, held its own heated exchanges over AI-based cyberattacks recently targeting the financial sector and the controversy surrounding the introduction of single-stock leveraged ETFs — two of the major economic policy disputes of the Lee Jae Myung administration's second year.
National Policy Committee chair Rep. Yoo Dong-su convened a plenary session before the audit opened and, with agreement from both parties, approved the adoption of five bank chiefs as witnesses: KB Kookmin Bank chief Lee Hwan-ju, Shinhan Bank chief Jung Sang-hyuk, Hana Bank chief Lee Ho-sung, Woori Bank chief Chung Jin-wan and NH NongHyup Bank chief Kang Tae-young.
Park Sang-hyuk, who leads the Democratic Party's side on the National Policy Committee, told a party audit strategy meeting that hackers "have already automated and sophisticated their attacks using AI, yet banks conducted only nine AI-based simulated hacking exercises over five years — and only started doing so this year." He said the gap between offensive and defensive capabilities was widening.
He added that the committee had adopted the heads of the five major banks and other financial institution chiefs as witnesses for the Financial Supervisory Service national audit on Oct. 19, saying lawmakers would hold them accountable for neglecting security investment despite rising profits.
The National Policy Committee audit of the Financial Services Commission, Korea Development Bank and Industrial Bank of Korea that followed was dominated by a dispute over responsibility for the introduction of single-stock leveraged ETFs.
The People Power Party alleged that Cheong Wa Dae had intervened in the product's launch and repeatedly called for the adoption of former presidential policy chief Kim Yong-beom and others as witnesses, while the Democratic Party rebuffed the claim as a conspiracy theory.
Rep. Park Sung-hoon of the People Power Party said public losses from the single-stock leveraged ETFs — rushed to market a week before local elections — reached 54 trillion won ($40.3 billion). "There are allegations that Cheong Wa Dae stepped in and pushed for the launch of a high-risk financial product," he said. "Why are you refusing to adopt former policy chief Kim as a witness?"
Democratic Party Rep. Park Hong-bae rebuffed the figure, arguing that the loss calculation was inaccurate. "The share prices of the underlying assets — SK hynix and Samsung Electronics — fell, and because they are leveraged, I think it is more appropriate to put the losses at roughly half that amount," he said.
On the Cheong Wa Dae intervention allegations, Park Hong-bae said the argument "has a tendency to veer into conspiracy-theory territory," pointing out that single-stock leveraged ETFs based on domestic stocks had already been trading in Hong Kong before the products were introduced in Korea. "There was no choice but to introduce them, if only to close the regulatory gap," he said.
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