Hong Jun-pyo says Kim Seung-won should face 'wife's hearing,' not confirmation

Former Daegu Mayor Hong Jun-pyo criticized Kim Seung-won, the nominee for minister of justice, over allegations that Kim lobbied for clinical trial approval of a new drug, saying Kim should face "not a confirmation hearing but a hearing before his wife."

Hong made the remarks Saturday on his SNS account, writing that "the content coming out of nominee Kim's confirmation hearing lately is truly astonishing."

The comments targeted allegations that Kim, at the request of a woman he described as a "younger sister" he had met at a bar, lobbied the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety to approve a clinical trial for a new drug developed by pharmaceutical company Genencel.

Hong argued that "it is hard to understand why the related case was given a deferred prosecution despite the discovery of hazardous substances in the drug and the emergence of suspicions about share price manipulation."

Hong also took a swipe at independent lawmaker Han Dong-hoon (Busan Buk-gap), who released recordings of phone calls related to the case. "The skill of that fellow who released the recordings — wherever he got them — is also remarkable," Hong wrote, adding sarcastically, "I wonder how, with such skill, he still couldn't catch Democratic Party leader Lee Jae Myung."

Earlier, in October 2021, Kim passed along a complaint related to Genencel's clinical trial to Kim Gang-rip, then commissioner of the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety, at the request of an acquaintance surnamed Yang. Two weeks later, the ministry approved the trial. Suspicions of lobbying subsequently emerged after it came to light that Genencel had obtained clinical approval using a fraudulent report that deliberately omitted side effects.

Kim denied the allegations in a statement Saturday, saying "the essence of this matter lies not in the animal test results themselves but in the fact that a person surnamed Kang submitted materials with omissions and fabrications," and that characterizing the nominee as having "lobbied for approval of a poison" based on an independent criminal act by a company official was "a malicious distortion."