by Our Foreign Desk

A FORMER South Korean prime minister said she was the victim of political vindictiveness after the Supreme Court rejected her appeal against corruption charges yesterday.

Han Myung Sook, who served as premier under peacemaking president Roh Moo Hyun in 2006 and 2007, was convicted of taking about £480,000 in bribes from a businessman in 2013.

“Today, I became a prisoner chained by political suppression. I’ll abide by the court’s ruling but regrettably I cannot accept it,” the 71-year-old said in a statement.

Ms Han was jailed for two years under the military dictatorship of the 1970s for alleged communist activities and went on to serve as minister for gender equality and the family under late president Kim Dae Jung, the architect of the “Sunshine Policy” of detente with North Korea.

Mr Roh continued that policy until his defeat by current president Lee Myung Bak in 2008.

He also came into conflict with the United States over the Yangju Highway incident, in which two schoolgirls were crushed to death by a US Army bridge-laying vehicle, demanding that the two soldiers responsible be tried in a Korean court
After Mr Roh left office, his brother Roh Gun Pyeong and his former secretary Chung Sang Moon were charged with corruption, while he, his wife and son were questioned over allegations that they had received the equivalent of millions of pounds in bribes from businessman Park Yeon Cha.

Corruption charges against the former president and his family after he left office drove him to commit suicide by jumping from a famous cliff on May 29 2009.