[Anchor]

The camp of nominee Kim Seung-won has claimed that Representative Han Dong-hoon, who has raised allegations regarding favors sought from the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety, fabricated the relevant transcripts and that media outlets are reporting distorted articles. Representative Han fired back, stating, "They are even resorting to media censorship."

Senior Legal Reporter Im Chanjong has the report.

[Reporter]

Kim Seung-won, nominee for Minister of Justice, arrived at the confirmation hearing preparation office at around 8:24 AM today (September 10).

[Kim Seung-won / Nominee for Minister of Justice: (Do you plan to directly address the suspicions that continue to be raised?) Our preparation team is addressing them one by one, and we will explain everything comprehensively. I will likely explain everything again today.]

About five minutes later, Nominee Kim's confirmation hearing preparation team released a statement claiming that the transcript made public by independent Representative Han Dong-hoon was fabricated.

They claimed that Representative Han released phone transcripts between a person designated as a broker, surnamed Yang, and former lawmaker Choi Jae-sung, but distorted the meaning of the conversation by omitting certain parts or altering their order.

They pointed out that a sentence implying the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety showed a positive response to the drug in question was omitted to mislead people into thinking there was never a possibility of passing the review from the beginning, and that a statement to the effect of "just check why the review is being delayed" was also omitted to make it look like a request for favors had been made.

Nominee Kim's camp released another statement in the afternoon, stating that the phone transcript between Nominee Kim and Mr. Yang released by Representative Han was also "pieced together."

In addition, they claimed that numerous media outlets are reporting distorted articles and demanded that the reported contents be corrected after verifying the original transcripts.

In response, Representative Han criticized Nominee Kim's camp, stating, "They are even censoring the media," and asking, "Which public office nominee in history has ever gone as far as media censorship?"

Representative Han also claimed that the materials released by Nominee Kim's camp today included a mention that Nominee Kim was aware Mr. Yang would receive a commission upon the approval of the new drug, revealing information that he himself had not even made public.

(Camera Reporter: Yang Hyun-chul | Video Editor: Choi Hye-ran)