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Top court upholds 2-yr sentence for former Prime Minister

August 19, 2015
(Yonhap)

Former Prime Minister Han Myeong-sook receives questions from reporters after her two-year jail sentence was upheld by the Supreme Court Thursday. (Yonhap)

SEOUL, Aug. 20 (Yonhap) – Seoul’s top court Thursday upheld a lower court’s ruling on former Prime Minister Han Myeong-sook, 71, sentencing her to two years behind bars for accepting bribes as political funds from the head of a local construction company.

The Supreme Court found Han, who was prime minister from 2006 to 2007 under the late liberal President Roh Moo-hyun, guilty of receiving 880 million won (US$760,000) in illicit political funds.

The sentence deprived Han of her parliamentary seat, reducing the number of seats held by the main opposition New Politics Alliance for Democracy to 128.