The move must nevertheless be reconsidered as it is a narrow-minded view that infringes on the people's right to know and goes against the spirit of the separation of the three branches of government. According to the new guidelines, the government could choose to refuse to submit documentation or face-to-face explanation about items of critical importance to welfare of the state. It would also deal strictly with members of the National Assembly and their staff should they disclose military secrets. The mindset here is that the management of state secrets and decisions as to whether they can be made public or not are entirely up to the executive branch.
Naturally it is undesirable to have secrets being recklessly leaked or disclosed in the National Assembly. Still, members of the National Assembly must have the discretionary power to view state secrets. That right is consistent with the principle of the people's right to know and the spirit of the separation of the three branches of government. The government is being self-serving if it thinks it is the only branch that gets to decide whether a secret is made public or not. The National Assembly is the people's representative institution, and it should be able to judge whether information would be better off known to the people for their benefit, that over the need for the information to remain protected, or not.
Before it talks about the responsibility of members of the National Assembly in making leaks, the government needs to be fair about managing those secrets. Its classification of secrets is arbitrary. The Ministry of National Defense has roughly 229,799 Class 2 secrets and 367,900 Class 3 secrets. Knowing that, the argument that the government's overdone secrecy brought about the recent leaks by Assembly members actually becomes persuasive. The government has to make it clear what the difference is between that which may be disclosed and that which may not.
The government is in a predicament about what to do with Assembly members who go public with state secrets, since it would be hard to hold them responsible through any other method than referral to the Assembly's Special Committee on Ethics. The Assembly, for its part, needs to be more self-regulating and revise its abstract ethical guidelines so that there are detailed outlines about what disciplinary measures are to be taken when secrets are revealed.
The Hankyoreh, 13 January 2005.
[Translations by Seoul Selection (PMS)]
