South Korea to Pardon Former President Park Geun-hye

(Bloomberg) -- South Korea’s government will grant a special pardon to former President Park Geun-hye, releasing her from prison after she spent nearly five years behind bars of a 22-year sentence for corruption. 

Park, a conservative and a prominent rival of the current leader, will be released on Dec. 31, the Justice Ministry said. “From the perspective of the national reconciliation, former president Park Geun-hye, who is serving a long-term prison sentence, will be granted a special pardon,” the ministry said in a statement Friday. 

Another former conservative president Lee Myung-bak, who is also serving a prison sentence for graft, was not included in the list of pardons released Friday. 

The move to free Park comes as current President Moon Jae-in winds down his single five-year term, which ends in May 2022. It could drive a wedge in Moon’s progressive camp ahead of a presidential election in March between those who view Park as undeserving of mercy and those who see pardons of past rivals as being in the spirit and tradition of the main liberal bloc.

“We must overcome the pain of the past and move forward into the new era,” Moon said in a statement, according to presidential spokeswoman Park Kyung-mi. “National unity and humble inclusion are desperately needed above all else,” Moon said, adding that Park’s health condition was also one of the major factors for the decision. 

Moon had previously stated he was not considering pardons for Park or Lee.

Park, 69, has been hospitalized several times over the past few years for shoulder and back pain. Park took office in 2013 as the country’s first female president. After being impeached in 2016, she was removed by the Constitutional Court in 2017 before her single five-year term ended. She was later convicted of criminal charges including bribery, extortion and abuse of power.

The conservative People Power Party immediately welcomed the move, while Moon’s ruling Democratic Party said it “respects” the president’s decision. Polling shows the public is leaning toward conservative candidate Yoon Suk-yeol to be the next president, while the Democrats have been calling for unity around its candidate Lee Jae-myung. 

South Korean presidents have a history of leaving office under a cloud. Three elected since the advent of full democracy in 1987 have been convicted of criminal charges and others, together with family members, have faced investigations for suspected graft after their terms ended.

The most prominent pardons came in 1997 when outgoing leader Kim Young-sam and then President-elect Kim Dae-jung agreed to grant amnesty to two military coup leaders -- Chun Doo-hwan and Roh Tae-woo -- in the spirit of national reconciliation. Democracy activist Kim Dae-jung, who spent six years in prisons as a dissident, was arrested by Chun’s government, where a military court initially sentenced him to death.

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