Corruption claims dog Ban Ki Moon’s return
SOUTH KOREA: It should have been the triumphant homecoming of a hero, the preamble to a glorious new career as his country’s next president.
Instead, the recently retired United Nations secretary-general Ban Ki Moon will land in South Korea today facing allegations of scandal and corruption personally and against members of his family.
Aides to Ban, who retired on New Year’s Eve after 10 years at the UN, say he will repeat indignant denials of claims by a Seoul magazine that he received US$230,000 (NZ$326,000) from a businessman in his previous job as South Korea’s foreign minister.
He has also insisted he knows nothing about criminal charges of bribery brought in a New York court against his brother and nephew – the latter described by prosecutors as a ‘‘master of deceit’’.
But the scandals will cast a shadow over what had seemed a certainty – Ban’s declaration of his candidacy in this year’s South Korean presidential election.
Sisa Journal, a local magazine, offered only anonymous corroboration of its claim that a businessman named Park Yeon Cha paid the sum to Ban in the 2000s.
The former UN boss’s spokesman said he would consider taking legal action.
‘‘It is utterly untrue, and we will hold the media strictly responsible for the reports,’’ said Lee Do Woon.
But the criminal charges brought against Ban’s relatives have been described in detail, and also have the potential to damage his candidacy.
Ban’s nephew, Joo Hyun Bahn, was released on US$250,000 bail on Wednesday after charges that he and his father, Ban Ki Sang, conspired to pay US$2.5 million in bribes to a Middle Eastern government official.
The unnamed man was supposed to persuade his country’s sovereign wealth fund to spend US$800m on buying a failing office building in Vietnam from a South Korean company which was close to bankruptcy.
Bahn, who uses the Western name order, and his father would supposedly, in return, receive a kick-back of their own.
But, according to New York prosecutors, an American who acted as middleman for the bribe defrauded them of the money.
‘‘There is truly no honour among thieves,’’ said Leslie Caldwell, a US assistant attorneygeneral. ‘‘The indictment alleges that two defendants wanted to bribe a government official; instead they were defrauded by their co-defendant.’’
Daniel Noble, an assistant US attorney, described Bahn, 38, as ‘‘a liar [and] a master of deceit’’.
Ban Ki Moon’s spokesman, Lee, said that the former secretarygeneral knew nothing of the scandal.
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