Chun to Give Up Money, Leave Seoul to Appease Public: Aides

Former President Chun Doo Hwan, under attack for alleged involvement in corruption, will surrender most of his wealth and retire from Seoul in an effort to allay mounting public criticism, aides said today.

Also today, a four-day parliamentary hearing opened to examine Chun’s role in suppressing a bloody uprising in the southern city of Kwangju in 1980.

One aide to Chun, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the ex-president will hold a news conference early next week to announce his decision to leave Seoul after turning over most of his wealth to the government.

“He will make a public apology, give up most of his wealth and live in seclusion somewhere in the countryside,” the aide said.

Another aide said Chun would live in an isolated, rented house in central South Korea, instead of going to his hometown in a southern province, where radical students on Nov. 11 torched and destroyed the thatch-roofed home where he was born. Living in seclusion in the countryside is a traditional Korean way of repentence for disgraced leaders.

The Hankook Ilbo newspaper said that if Chun takes the action, President Roh Tae Woo is expected to pardon him.

Widespread protests have broken out in the last two months urging the arrest and punishment of Chun for alleged corruption and human rights violations.