Yet Another Law-and-Order Man Joins Seoul Cabinet : South Korea: The president ignores opposition demands for sweeping changes in a shuffling of his ministers.
South Korean President Roh Tae Woo, in a move affirming that he intends to deal sternly with anti-government protests, shuffled his Cabinet on Sunday, making only four changes and including the appointment of yet another law-and-order man.
As justice minister, Roh named former Prosecutor General Kim Ki Choon, 51. He also named a retired general, Ahn Pil Joon, 59, president of Korea Coal Co., to be health and social affairs minister.
Rhee Yong Man, 57, chairman of the Bank Supervisory Board, was appointed finance minister, and Jin Nyum, 50, vice minister of the Economic Planning Board, was named energy minister.
Ignoring opposition demands for a sweeping change in his government aimed at carrying out further democratic reform, Roh left untouched the 22 other Cabinet portfolios and made no changes in either his presidential staff or the Agency for National Security Planning, the former KCIA.
Lee Su Jong, Roh’s spokesman, quoted the president as saying that the new Cabinet should “respond to popular wishes for law and order and social and economic stability.”
The moves indicated again that Roh, whose constitutionally limited term as president ends in 21 months, is betting that protests against his government will run out of steam. The unrest was sparked by the fatal police beating of a student April 26, and it has brought to the surface complaints about inflation, rising housing costs, corruption, environmental disruption and income disparities.
Roh, however, will issue a set of “instructions” to the new Cabinet and his ruling Democratic Liberal Party on Tuesday in place of an address to the nation that government officials earlier had said he would make. Issuance of the instructions, which will be telecast live to the nation, is expected to be the last specific step Roh takes to defuse the present wave of political unrest.
The day after the fatal beating, the president fired his home affairs minister, who was responsible for managing the nation’s 130,000 police. Authorities arrested five riot police officers accused in the killing of Kang Kyung Dae, 20, a Myungji University freshman.
Roh named a new prime minister last Friday and announced an amnesty for 258 people jailed or accused of violating strictures of a Draconian National Security Law before that law was revised May 10.
But these steps did not halt the protests. Roh’s new prime minister, Chung Won Shik, 62, had earlier established a reputation as a hard-liner by firing teachers for joining an outlawed union while serving as education minister. Also the amnesty did not include the most prominent imprisoned dissidents and served to underscore the harshness of crackdowns by revealing that 206 people had been jailed or indicted merely for praising Communist North Korea.
Although the toll of dead since the unrest began a month ago rose to nine during an anti-government rally in Seoul on Saturday, rain and cold weather limited the turnout to one of the smallest yet for a planned demonstration.
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