South Korean investigators indict Unification Church leader over alleged ties to ex-first lady

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SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — South Korean investigators on Friday indicted the 82-year-old leader of the Unification Church, Hak Ja Han, over allegations that she instructed church officials to bribe the wife of jailed former President Yoon Suk Yeol and a conservative lawmaker close to him.

Han, widow of the church’s founder Sun Myung Moon, has denied the allegations, and the church condemned her arrest last month as a disrespectful act against an “internationally respected religious leader.”

The church’s alleged ties to former first lady Kim Keon Hee, who was arrested and charged in August over bribery and other suspected crimes, have become a central focus of ongoing special investigations into Yoon’s presidency.

Yoon, an outspoken conservative, was formally removed from office in April over a short-lived martial law decree in December that triggered his impeachment.

An investigative team led by special prosecutor Min Joong-ki, which probes corruption allegations surrounding Kim, said it indicted Han and her former chief secretary on charges of bribery, violating political funding laws, embezzling church funds, and instructing the destruction of evidence.

Investigators, who have continued questioning Han while she remains in custody, claim that she and her former secretary conspired with another church official to give luxury goods to Kim on two occasions in July 2022 in an attempt to seek business favors.

Han is also suspected of instructing the church official, who has also been arrested, to deliver 100 million won ($70,000) in bribes to conservative lawmaker Kweon Seong-dong in January 2022, months before Yoon was elected president that March. Investigators allege the church offered to help Yoon’s presidential campaign by mobilizing followers and using its organizational network in exchange for future government support for its policies and events it hoped Yoon would attend.

Kweon, a staunch Yoon loyalist arrested last month and indicted this week for violating political funding laws, has denied receiving the church’s money.

Han and her former secretary are also suspected of instructing the arrested church official, Yoon Young-ho, to destroy evidence after obtaining information around October 2022 about an investigation into their alleged gambling activities at a U.S. casino.

Yoon Suk Yeol’s martial law lasted only a few hours before the liberal-led legislature voted to lift it. He was re-arrested in July and now faces rebellion and other charges.

Current liberal President Lee Jae Myung has also authorized two other special prosecutor probes on Yoon, which focuses on Yoon’s planning and execution of his martial law imposition on Dec. 3 and his government’s alleged cover-up of a marine’s drowning death during a 2023 flood rescue operation.

Han is the top leader of the Unification Church, officially called the Family Federation for World Peace and Unification, which her husband founded in 1954.

A self-proclaimed messiah who preached new interpretations of the Bible and conservative family values, Moon built the church into an international movement with millions of followers and extensive business interests. The church is widely known for mass weddings, pairing thousands of couples who often are from different countries.