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View Full Version : Kerry's Fund-Raisers Met With South Korean Spy



ELVIS
09-22-2004, 11:15 PM
Tuesday, Sept. 21, 2004 (http://www.newsmax.com/archives/articles/2004/9/21/102412.shtml)

WASHINGTON – A South Korean who met with Sen. John Kerry's fund-raisers to discuss creating a political group for Korean-Americans was an intelligence agent for his country, raising concerns among some U.S. officials that either he or his government might have tried to influence this fall's election.

South Korean officials and U.S. officials told The Associated Press that Chung Byung-Man, a consular officer in Los Angeles, actually worked for South Korea's National Intelligence Service.

A spokesman for the South Korean consulate office said that Chung was sent home in May amid "speculation" he became involved with the Kerry campaign and Democratic Party through contacts with fund-raiser Rick Yi, and that his identity couldn't be discussed further.
"According to international tradition, we cannot identify, we cannot say who he is, because he is intelligence people," spokesman Min Ryu said.

The State Department said it had discussed Chung's reported activities with the South Korean government and has no reason to doubt Seoul's representations he was an intelligence agent.

'Inconsistent' With Vienna Convention

The department believes Chung's contacts with donors and fund-raisers, if accurately described in reports, were "inconsistent" with the 1963 Vienna Convention that prohibits visiting foreign officials from interfering in the internal politics and affairs of host countries, a spokesman for its legal affairs office said.

Kerry campaign spokesman Chad Clanton said the campaign did not know Chung was an intelligence agent or that Yi, one of the campaign's key fund-raisers in the Asian-American community, was meeting with him until it was brought to light by the AP.

The AP first reported this spring that Yi and other Kerry fund-raisers and donors had met with Chung, but at the time Chung was identified only as a diplomat. Yi resigned from Kerry's campaign after the story, and Kerry returned $4,000 in donations he had solicited because of concerns about their origins.

AP was alerted to the meetings and Chung's identity as an intelligence agent by Democrat donors and fund-raisers who said they were uncomfortable with the activities.

A South Korean government official in Seoul and two longtime U.S. officials in Washington, both speaking on condition of anonymity because Chung's intelligence work is classified, told AP that Chung worked for South Korea's NIS, the country's CIA equivalent.

The U.S. officials said Chung had registered with the Justice Department as a friendly foreign intelligence agent on U.S. soil, and that his activities had raised concern he or his government had tried to influence the fall presidential election through "extracurricular activities."

The FBI has not begun a formal counterintelligence investigation because Chung left the United States in May, the officials said.

The NIS dismissed any suggestion the South Korean government tried to influence American politics as a "totally groundless rumor and all fiction."

South Korea has been frustrated over the deadlock in talks on North Korea's nuclear activities, while at the same facing the Bush administration's planned withdrawal of thousands of U.S. troops from the tense region. One expert said Chung's actions were consistent with Seoul's concerns with the Bush administration even if he didn't get a direct order.



:elvis:

FORD
09-22-2004, 11:43 PM
Until the Republicans condemn Bush for having multiple Israeli spies in his cabinet, they better dare not accuse Kerry of any such things.

freak
09-22-2004, 11:50 PM
Originally posted by FORD
Until the Republicans condemn Bush for having multiple Israeli spies in his cabinet, they better dare not accuse Kerry of any such things.

Sorry Ford.

Your side shot their credibility wad with those ineptly faked documents.

Bush could sodomize goats on national tv and the public would only blame CBS.

ODShowtime
09-23-2004, 12:38 AM
Only the moronic ones. There is an on-going FBI investigation into Israeli spying and policy influence in the Department of Defense. It goes back to the same people who worked in Israel and lobbied hard for the Iraq war. Look it up.