Why no cuffs for former President Lee

Former President Lee Myung-bak’s first court appearance Wednesday, since his arrest over corruption in March, may have raised some eyebrows as he was not in handcuffs.

He instead was holding papers on his way to the court to read a statement before the judge.

This was in sharp contrast to how his successor Park Geun-hye has been treated.

Park, who is also behind bars on various corruption charges, has always been brought to court in handcuffs.

The different treatment for the former heads of state is due to recently-revised government guidelines, according to the Ministry of Justice.

They began taking effect last month.

The ministry’s new instruction stipulates that suspects in custody who have yet to be subject to a verdict and are unlikely to run away do not need to be in handcuffs in their court appearances, depending on a decision by the chief of a detention center.

The new guidelines also allow those who are aged over 65, female, severely disabled people and critically ill patients to appear in court without handcuffs — although those cases also need the detention center chief’s approval.

Given that Lee is 76 years old and not likely to flee, he was allowed to attend his first hearing with no handcuffs.

According to the justice ministry, Lee was not the only one to benefit from the new guidelines as more than 70 suspects have appeared in court without wearing handcuffs over the last month.

Until the ministry revised the guidelines on how to treat jailed suspects, the National Human Rights Commission of Korea had repeatedly pointed out that it violates personal rights to expose a suspect tied in ropes and clad in handcuffs to the media during a transfer.

As a result, Justice Minister Park Sang-ki gave an order to change the guidelines when he took office last July.

As a result, when Park attends a hearing next time, she will also not be required to wear handcuffs — although she has refused to appear since a court extended an arrest warrant for her in October last year, claiming that she was not being tried fairly.

According to the ministry, most advanced countries police use handcuffs based on the United Nations’ Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners.

“When the prisoners are being moved to or from an institution, they shall be exposed to public view as little as possible, and proper safeguards shall be adopted to protect them from insult, curiosity and publicity in any form,” it notes.

However, some claim that the government’s new instructions go against fairness.

“Those with minor disabilities are also unlikely to run away, but they appear in court, wearing handcuffs, which may cause controversy over fairness,” said a critic.

In response, the justice ministry is reviewing whether to put some suspects in handcuffs at their court appearances even though they do not meet the requirements of the new guidelines.