President Lee Jae-myung said on the 25th that "the police will wield the greatest power among state institutions," and instructed the Prime Minister's Office to set up a reform body to monitor police power. The move is seen as a response to a situation in which controversy over botched police investigations and concerns about expanded police authority following the abolition of prosecutors' supplementary investigation powers have weighed on his approval ratings. The Democratic Party of Korea also launched a police reform task force headed by Rep. Kim Nam-hee, a lawyer by training who has urged caution on scrapping those powers, and began follow-up work.
Lee made the remarks at a Cabinet meeting at Cheong Wa Dae the same day, referring to allegations that police covered up a disappearance case on Jeju Island. "Recently, problems with lax discipline in the police and a lack of accountability on public safety have emerged as quite serious issues," he said. "The police are a state organization where the chain of command matters a great deal, and command responsibility is very important," Lee said. "They have the authority to command, but on the other hand they must of course bear responsibility commensurate with that authority."
With the abolition of prosecutors' supplementary investigation powers set for October, the president moved quickly to demand countermeasures after the police revealed serious flaws not only in investigative capacity but also in organizational discipline through cases including the Jang Yun-gi case and the Jeju disappearance case. Responding to the argument that these were deviations by individual officers, Lee said, "If it ends with disciplining frontline staff alone, what would be the point of having a chain of command?" — placing weight on the responsibility of those holding command authority. He added that "doubts arise as to whether the police are capable of fully carrying out this great authority and responsibility."
The Prime Minister's Office, which received the president's instruction, immediately began reviewing the creation of a new body. Officials in the ruling bloc expect the outline of the reform body to emerge soon, given Prime Minister Han Sung-sook's style.
The Democratic Party also announced the establishment of a police reform task force under the direct supervision of party leader Kim Min-seok immediately after the president's remarks and began follow-up work. The task force will consist of about 10 members led by Rep. Kim, half of them outside figures such as experts and representatives of victims. The party's own members on the panel will be lawmakers with police backgrounds.
Rep. Kim, who heads the task force, has been a leading voice urging caution during deliberations on revisions to the Criminal Procedure Act, including the abolition of supplementary investigation powers, stressing the need to protect victims. She has also strongly argued for referring all cases, including those cleared of suspicion, to the prosecution office as a way to minimize the side effects of stripping prosecutors of supplementary investigation powers. Given how strongly she has pushed for this as a check on the police, the task force is expected to consider the idea.
The Democratic Party had initially considered setting up a task force to check police power in response to the abolition of the Prosecution Service, but appears to have upgraded it to a party body focused on police reform itself as criticism mounted over the recent controversy on botched investigations.
At a forum on police reform held the same day by the Democratic Party and others in the ruling bloc, participants argued that the National Police Commission, currently an advisory body, should be upgraded to a collegiate administrative agency under the prime minister with the authority to direct and supervise the police as a whole. Other proposals included splitting the autonomous police system into two tiers and strengthening external oversight of investigative police. Rep. Lim Ho-sun of the Democratic Party, a former police officer, bowed his head and said, "I feel like I have committed a capital crime."
Attorney Lee Chang-min, who took part in the forum, said, "Despite the sweeping expansion of police authority, the mechanisms to check it are inadequate," calling for a genuine shift to an autonomous police system and stronger external oversight of investigations. He proposed converting the current single-tier autonomous police system into a two-tier structure at the provincial and metropolitan level to disperse police power.
At the Cabinet meeting, Lee also called for measures to protect core industrial technologies. "Technology security is the foundation that underpins the national industrial economy, so we must prepare even more thoroughly," he said. "Relevant agencies, including the National Intelligence Service and the police, should firmly establish a response system with the attitude that protecting core industrial technologies is national security." He stressed that "we must not allow even the slightest gap in technology security, so that the nation's core technologies, built with blood and sweat over a long time, can drive South Korea's continued growth."
