Park Jung-hyun, a former mayor of Buyeo County, has been appointed chair of the presidential Committee on Decentralization and Balanced Development, filling a post that had been vacant for six months. Lawmakers Song Young-gil and Kim Byung-joo of the Democratic Party of Korea were named special presidential advisers for peace diplomacy and for defense policy, respectively.
Park, appointed on the 1st, is a native of Buyeo in South Chungcheong Province and has served as special policy adviser to the South Chungcheong governor and as the province's vice governor for political affairs. Officials said his long career in local government made him well suited to the role.
"He is an administrator who has experienced local government across the board and has dealt firsthand with regional decline and imbalance," said Sung Ki-hong, senior presidential secretary for public communication. "We expect him to provide practical support for a shift toward balanced national development, in which regions become engines of growth in their own right rather than relying on a growth structure centered on the capital area."
The appointment is also expected to add momentum to the government's national land transformation policy, built around the "five poles and three special zones" framework and a set of megaprojects. The committee had been run by an acting chair for more than six months, since former chair Kim Kyoung-soo stepped down in March to run for governor of South Gyeongsang Province.
The two advisory appointments cover the areas of foreign affairs and unification, and of defense. Both are sitting lawmakers and will serve concurrently in unpaid honorary posts. Song is a six-term lawmaker who has built broad experience and expertise in foreign affairs and unification, including a term as chair of the National Assembly's Foreign Affairs and Unification Committee. Shortly after the announcement, Song wrote on social media that he would "faithfully assist President Lee Jae-myung in forging a path to peace on the Korean Peninsula, drawing on the diplomatic experience and international networks I have built."
Sung described Kim as "a defense policy expert who served as a four-star Army general" and "the right person to add the public's voice to national security and defense reform." Kim said he would "set aside personal interest and devote myself to the success of the Lee Jae-myung administration and the building of a strong Republic of Korea."
