Prosecutors on Thursday raided online news outlet Newstapa and cable channel JTBC in connection with their reporting of an alleged fake interview given in 2021 to discredit then opposition presidential candidate Yoon Suk Yeol.
The Seoul Central District Prosecutors Office sent prosecutors and investigators to Newstapa’s office in central Seoul and JTBC’s head office in western Seoul in the morning to seize materials related to their coverage of the interview on the eve of last year’s presidential election.
At Newstapa, a confrontation occurred as the company refused to cooperate with the search and seizure warrant without the presence of its lawyer.
Prosecutors also raided the homes of a Newstapa reporter surnamed Han and a former JTBC reporter surnamed Bong.
The case centers on the allegations that Kim Man-bae, a suspect in the scandal-ridden Daejang-dong development project pushed in the mid-2010s by opposition leader Lee Jae-myung as the mayor of Seongnam, suggested in his interview with Newstapa-affiliated journalist Shin Hak-lim in September 2021 that Yoon was the mastermind behind the Daejang-dong scandal.
The interview was reported by Newstapa, JTBC and other media, beginning March 6, 2022, just three days before the presidential election, confusing voters. Kim paid 165 million won (US$123,500) to Shin days after the interview but has dismissed it as a “private conversation,” denying any intention to influence the presidential election.
Source: Yonhap News Agency