New South Korean PM is former spy chief

New South Korean PM is former spy chief

SEOUL (Reuters): South Korea's new "acting" prime minister Kim
Jong-pil, 72, has been at the center of Korean politics and a
controversial figure for nearly four decades.

His appointment was blocked in the National Assembly by the
opposition Grand National Party -- which still retains a majority
despite losing December's election -- because of his checkered
career.

Kim Jong-pil played a pivotal role as a young army colonel in
the 1961 coup d'etat that brought General Park Chung-hee to power
and was Park's right-hand man until the dictator's assassination
in 1979.

"J.P.", as he is popularly known, is embarking on his second
stint as prime minister, having served in that capacity under
Park in the 1970s.

He founded the infamous Korean Central Intelligence Agency
(KCIA) that over the years jailed, tortured and attempted to
murder President Kim Dae-jung for his opposition to autocratic
regimes.

Kim Jong-pil used the KCIA to amass money in an attempt to
build a one-party state under Park, according to Mark Clifford's
"Troubled Tiger", an authoritative history of the period.

A nephew and close associate of Park, he was implicated in
several scandals in the 1960s, including stock market
manipulation and abuse of foreign exchange privileges, though
never convicted, Clifford said.

On May 18, 1980, in the turbulent period following Park's
assassination, Kim Jong-pil and other key Park lieutenants were
arrested as strongman President Chun Doo-hwan declared martial
law following mass street demonstrations.

Also picked up that night was Kim Dae-jung, who would later be
charged with treason in connection with a subsequent uprising in
the southern city of Kwangju that was brutally put down by the
army.

The following month, the martial law commander charged that
nine politicians and former government officials, including Kim
Jong-pil, had illegally amassed almost $150 million while in
office.

Kim Jong-pil was accused of holding almost $36 million in
various holdings, including a tangerine orchard, dairy farm and
newspaper company.

Kim Jong-pil was also said to have over $7 million in secret
bank accounts in Seoul, according to Clifford's book. He was
"purged' from the governing party.

Kim Jong-pil began a comeback in the 1987 presidential
elections, running against Kim Dae-jung and his predecessor as
president, Kim Young-sam, but finishing with just eight percent
of the vote.

The "three Kims" as they then became known, split the vote,
allowing former general and Chun protege, Roh Tae Woo to win the
election.

Kim Jong-pil joined forces with Kim Young-sam after the latter
won the 1992 election, but split with him about a year later.
The strange alliance between Kim Dae-jung and the man whose KCIA
once tried to assassinate him and who hounded him throughout his
career in opposition raised eyebrows when it was announced last
October.

But Kim Dae-jung knew he could not win unless he broadened his
support from his traditional base in the southwest Cholla region
and reassure South Korean voters that he was not the radical,
leftist rabble-rouser that he was painted as by successive
military regimes.

The price of that support was a deal to name J.P as prime
minister and endow what has largely been a ceremonial office with
new powers while turning the presidential form of government into
a parliamentary one.

Kim Jong-pil's support, as it turned out, was crucial in the
election, which Kim Dae-jung won by barely a one-percent margin.
But it remains to be seen whether Kim Dae-jung will be able to
fill his side of the bargain and make his "acting prime minister"
a powerful one.