No Official Invitation: Behind Former Election Chief's Luxury European Trips

The joint police-prosecution investigation headquarters probing lax operations and irregularities at the National Election Commission (NEC) has secured testimony indicating that the "foreign trip destinations were decided by the chairperson" regarding former NEC Chairperson Roh Tae-ak's suspected "sightseeing-style overseas trips."

During an interrogation of an NEC official yesterday, the joint investigation headquarters secured testimony stating, "The chairperson decided the destination countries, and the chairperson was also aware of the budget allocation details for the spouse."

It was revealed that the structure involved the NEC selecting candidate countries for trips and reporting them, after which the chairperson made the final decision on the destination.

Previously, the joint investigation headquarters received a response from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs stating that none of the three overseas trips accompanied by former Chairperson Roh's spouse involved official invitations from the host countries.

This means the couple went on overseas trips together after the chairperson selected the desired countries without any invitations from the host nations.

Former Chairperson Roh was accompanied by his spouse on all three of his trips: an 8-night, 9-day trip to Australia and New Zealand in December 2022, a 7-night, 9-day trip to Germany and Estonia in November 2024, and an 8-night, 10-day trip to Denmark and Sweden in November of last year.

Among these, the trip to Germany and Estonia cost 71.94 million won, and the trip to Denmark and Sweden cost 90.53 million won.

It was found that former Chairperson Roh's wife used business class flights on two of the trips, excluding the Australia and New Zealand trip.

For those two trips alone, the airfare and lodging expenses incurred for his wife totaled approximately 40 million won.

The fact that his spouse accompanied him on former Chairperson Roh's overseas trips was not specified in reports previously disclosed to the public by the NEC.

During a National Assembly parliamentary investigation committee hearing last month, former Chairperson Roh stated that he had never requested spouse-accompanied trips first, but explained, "Everything had been done that way until now, and no one raised any objections, so I did not have any particular doubts about it."
※ Please note: This article was translated by AI and may contain errors.