Partisan disputes mount over arrest of former opposition party lawmaker

SEOUL, Nov. 15 (Yonhap) -- Rival parties squared off Saturday over a ranking member of the opposition who has been defying orders for his arrest on charges of taking illegal election funds.

Kim Min-seok, member of the decision-making supreme council of the main
opposition Democratic Party (DP), has been staging a sit-in protest at his party
headquarters, denying the charges and accusing the prosecution of launching a
politically motivated probe against him.
About 100 DP lawmakers and party officials have been sitting alongside Kim to
fend off prosecutors attempting to execute the arrest warrant issued on Friday.
"Issuing an arrest warrant against Kim is the same as attempting to arrest the
whole party," said Kim Yoo-jung, the party's spokeswoman. "We will fight off the
prosecution using all possible means."
Kim, 44, is accused of receiving illicit donations worth hundreds of millions of
won from several business acquaintances ahead of the parliamentary elections in
April. A former legislator who ran unsuccessfully against President Lee Myung-bak
for Seoul mayor in 2002, Kim failed to win a National Assembly seat this year.
Prosecutors imposed an overseas travel ban on Kim last month and have been
tracing his money transfers since then. Kim has refused several prosecutors'
summons.
The ruling Grand National Party denounced its rival's attempts to "disturb fair
and just execution of the law."
"The main opposition party has become a hideout for a corrupted and guilty
politician," said the party's spokesman, Cha Myung-jin. "We have a lot of work to
do in the parliament. The party should stop wasting its time over an unreasonable
claim."