Moon Jane is on the growth list of former presidents who have fallen into legal trouble during or after their tenure.
Former South Korean President Moon Jae was charged with bribery on April 24th.
The move by prosecutors will make him the latest in the growing list of former leaders of East Asian countries, allowing him to find himself in legitimate warm water.
This case relates to appointing his then-in-law to a lucrative no-show job with a Thai airline on the budget during his step-term.
The 72-year-old was charged in the same case where a former lawmaker named Lee San-jik was charged with bribery and breach of trust, the Jeongju District Attorney’s Office said in a statement.
According to the statement, prosecutors were investigating whether Lee’s appointment as head of small business and startup agents would receive salary and living expenses on Thailand Eastle Jet between 2018 and 2020.
Prosecutors argue that the money his then-in-law received as the executive director of 5.95 million Thai baht (approximately $178,000), was irregular and constituted a bribe to the then-president of the month.
Related Stories
Prosecutors said his son-in-law spent only a short period of time in a Thai company’s office and performed minor duties during the period he claimed to be working far from South Korea.
The prosecutor’s office said it had found no evidence that Moon had given Lee a direct political benefit, but said Lee, who was involved in Moon’s campaign, was expected to be repaid.
Prosecutors cited previous bribery cases, including former presidents Park Geun Hai and Lee Myungbak.
Moon, Lee and their legal representatives have yet to comment, but Moon’s allies, a leading liberal opposition Democratic Party, criticised the indictment, calling it a politically motivated attempt by supporters of his successor, Yoon Sook-Yeol, and called it in a prosecution service to humiliate the former Liberal leader ahead of the upcoming snap elections.
The Koreans head to the polls in June after Yoon was banished in December 2024 for trying to impose martial law.
The former top prosecutor is currently accused of rebellion and rebellion, and has accused him of denial.
The Democratic Committee warned separately that it would retain the prosecutor’s office to explain the charges.
Liberal Lee Jae Myung from the Democrats on the Moon is at the current frontline of the polls, and his campaign characterized the charges as political retaliation by indictment and clampdowns of the previous administration.
Liberal Moon, a lawyer and civil rights activist, was president between 2017 and 2022.
He is known for pushing to reconcile with North Korea and meeting with UN Kim Jong three times to promote the beginning of diplomacy between Kim and US President Donald Trump during Trump’s first term in the White House.
Moon’s supporters believe he achieved his current stalled cooperation with North Korea and avoided a major armed conflict with the Pyongyang regime.
However, his opponents accused him of being a naive North Korean sympathizer who helped him buy Kim to advance his nuclear program in the face of international sanctions.
Over the past two decades, a string of South Korean leaders have mostly faced challenges or scandals towards the end of conditions or after taking office.
In 2017, Park Geun Hai, the country’s first female president, was expelled and arrested in a corruption scandal. Before she received a presidential pardon from Moon, she was brought to trial, convicted and sentenced to 20 years in prison.
Park’s conservative predecessor, Lee Myung-bak, was also arrested for various crimes a few years after his retirement, but Moon’s friend, former liberal president, Lo Moo-hyun, died in 2009 during a corruption investigation.
