Police to Exclude Officials from Hometowns in All Provincial Audit Officer Appointments

The police will assign officials who are not from the local region to all positions of Audit and Inspection Human Rights Officers responsible for audit and inspection duties at provincial police agencies.

The Korean National Police Agency held the second meeting of the Task Force for Follow-up Measures on the Revised Criminal Procedure Act today and discussed this plan.

The police decided to place individuals who are not from the respective local regions into all provincial police agency Audit and Inspection Human Rights Officer positions in line with the police personnel reshuffle for the second half of the year.

This is intended to effectively apply the peer-exclusion system to block any possibility that ties to local police organizations might influence audits and inspections.

Investigative personnel will also be reinforced.

The police decided to deploy additional personnel to investigative departments, in addition to the 881 personnel previously discussed.

Judging that reinforcing personnel is urgent before the implementation of the revised Criminal Procedure Act on October 2, the police plan to internally adjust personnel from areas where public safety will not be disrupted and deploy them to investigative departments first.

The police are pursuing a plan to reallocate personnel secured by reducing the quota of 130 riot police units by about 10 percent to fields such as investigation, public safety, and internal control.

A total of 1,040 personnel will be reallocated, including 645 for integrated investigation teams and 80 for women and youth investigations.

However, following the previous decision to reallocate 881 personnel to investigative departments, internal discontent over personnel shortages and work burdens is expected to grow as additional reinforcements are carried out.

The police plan to continue discussions on increasing investigative personnel through new recruitment by consulting with related ministries thereafter.

They also decided to conduct training related to the revised Criminal Procedure Act for those working in investigative departments, including the newly deployed personnel.

Management of cases involving prosecutors' requests for supplementary investigations following the implementation of the revised Criminal Procedure Act will also be strengthened.

It was decided to operate dedicated departments at the National Police Agency and provincial police agencies in charge of implementation, inspection, and management regarding cases requested by prosecutors.

The dedicated departments are scheduled to operate in line with the police personnel reshuffle for the second half of the year, following consultations with related ministries.

A 40-member internal corruption investigation unit will be newly established directly under the head of the National Office of Investigation, and personnel will be reinforced in the investigation review division, which checks the completeness of case handling.

The Korean National Police Agency stated, "Along with operating dedicated departments, we plan to announce plans to strengthen the management of cases requested by prosecutors under the revised Criminal Procedure Act at a later date."

(Photo: Yonhap News)
※ Please note: This article was translated by AI and may contain errors.