Kim Min-seok Says Party Must Rein In Excessive Prosecution Reform Demands

Kim Min-seok, leader of the ruling Democratic Party of Korea, pushed back against hard-liners within his party on prosecution reform, saying "it is now time for the party to rein this in."

Appearing on the Democratic Party's YouTube channel "Minti07" on the 6th, Kim said: "Through prosecution reform, we have met most of the demands originally raised by those who pushed hardest for it, and in some areas we have gone further. This is now the point where we need to focus more on reforms that affect people's livelihoods."

He added that "if there is a risk that excessive demands or claims could damage the entire reform camp and its ranks, the front line and the president's leadership itself, it is now time for the party to rein this in."

Kim pointed to "the lives of the people" as the standard for reform, stressing that "what matters is not only the clarity of the goal but actually delivering results — the substance of those results." Citing the debate over the National Security Act during the era of the Uri Party, he noted that "opinions split internally between those who wanted to focus on amendments to remove the most objectionable provisions and those who wanted to abolish the law entirely, and in the end the matter was never settled, which left the Uri Party itself in political difficulty for having pushed it."

On the parliamentary audit of government agencies beginning the same day, he named financial support for low-income households, jobs for young adults, and housing issues including jeonse (a lump-sum deposit lease) and monthly rent as priority items for review. "We are the ruling party, but we are also the National Assembly, so I think it is right for us to play our role as the ruling party and as the legislature by checking whether the government has missed anything or fallen short," Kim said.

Regarding the audit of the Supreme Court, which is in conflict with the Presidential Office over the renomination of Supreme Court justices, he said: "I expect Chair Seo Young-kyo will manage the committee as a whole appropriately and with restraint, while asking everything that needs to be asked and pressing on everything that needs to be pressed."

On the controversy over "The Assassins," a film dealing with the assassination of first lady Yuk Young-soo, Kim drew a line, saying "most films mix fact with fiction, and it is not desirable for politics to step in over that."