Seoul court acquits South Korean opposition leader on charges of instigating perjury

SEOUL: South Korean opposition leader Lee Jae-myung was acquitted on Monday on charges that he persuaded a witness to lie in court to understate Lee's past criminal conviction, in a rare moment of relief from broad legal troubles that threaten to derail his political career.

Lee thanked the Seoul Central District Court judge after the ruling for “bringing back truth and justice.” The prosecution didn't immediately say whether it would appeal.

The same court earlier this month sentenced Lee to a suspended prison term for violating election law by making false public statements while running for president in the 2022 election, which he narrowly lost to conservative rival Yoon Suk Yeol.

If that conviction stands, Lee would be unseated as a lawmaker and barred from running for president in the next election, for which polls now show him to be the favourite. But Lee, who is facing five different trials over corruption and other charges, will likely challenge any guilty verdict he receives, and it's uncertain whether the Supreme Court would decide on any of the cases before the vote in March 2027.

The ruling Monday at the Seoul court was about whether Lee pressured a former employee of Seongnam city into giving false testimony in court in 2019. The testimony was meant to downplay Lee's 2002 conviction that, as a lawyer, he had helped a journalist of KBS television to impersonate a prosecutor to secure an interview with then-Seongnam Mayor Kim Byung-ryang over corruption suspicions regarding the allocation of new apartments.

Lee was later elected as Seongnam's mayor in 2010 and held the job until 2018. While running for Gyeonggi provincial governor in 2018, Lee said he had been wrongly accused over the incident, prompting prosecutors to indict him on charges of violating election laws by making false statements. Lee was acquitted in 2019, partially based on the testimony of the Seongnam city employee, who had worked as Kim's secretary and said the former mayor contemplated dropping charges against the journalist to establish Lee as the main culprit in the incident.

Prosecutors indicted Lee on charges of instigating perjury in October last year, presenting transcripts of telephone conversations that they said showed him persuading the Seongnam city employee to testify in court that Lee was framed. In acquitting Lee of the charges, the court ruled that the evidence presented by prosecutors was insufficient to prove his intent of instigating perjury.