Ahn Cheol-soo and Han Dong-hoon urge President Lee Jae-myung to apologize immediately

Ahn Cheol-soo of the People Power Party and independent lawmaker Han Dong-hoon on the 11th urged President Lee Jae-myung to apologize immediately. The controversy stems from a post President Lee uploaded to his X (formerly Twitter) account that day mentioning the late former Seoul Mayor Park Won-soon. Opposition figures demanded the deletion of the post and an apology.

In his X post addressing the problem of malicious comments — that is, personal attacks and defamatory posts — the president wrote, "I am reminded of the late Mayor Park Won-soon, the person who made me aware of the importance of communication and of social media as a means of it." He went on to recount a past conversation with the former mayor at the Seoul city residence, writing, "Spraying filth through abusive language, profanity, and sneering in forums of communication is not communication but an obstruction of it."

On the 11th, Representative Ahn posted on his Instagram under the title "After abolishing the right to request supplementary investigations, now summoning Park Won-soon — is Lee Jae-myung the president of criminals?" and pointed out, "This is clearly secondary victimization." In the same post, he wrote, "I have read a book written by the victim, who suffered for years and is only now taking steps toward recovery. Yet he romanticizes a sex offender." Ahn added, "Has he forgotten what Democratic Party lawmakers did back then, branding her 'the accuser'?" and asked, "Does he intend to rehabilitate another sex offender of the same ilk as Druking's Kim Kyung-soo, followed by Oh Keo-don and Ahn Hee-jung?" He emphasized, "A president's message carries different weight. It must not be so light as to be inspired by the social media account of a mere sex offender." Ahn demanded, "Today's X post by President Lee is clearly secondary victimization. Delete it immediately and apologize."

As criticism from opposition figures continued, the Justice Party also issued a statement demanding a retraction and an apology, saying that the president "glorified a perpetrator of power-based sexual violence in order to justify his style of social media communication." With calls for an apology coming from both sides of the aisle, attention is focused on how President Lee will respond.