Prosecution disputes police chief

[Anchor]

During the emergency martial law, it has been revealed through the prosecution's indictment that National Police Chief Cho Ji-ho received a request for support in the arrest of key politicians.

This claim contradicts what Chief Cho and the police have previously stated.

The police have strongly denied these allegations.

Reporter Yoon Bom-i has the story.

[Report]

Police Chief Cho Ji-ho has consistently claimed that he refused orders to arrest politicians.

[Noh Jeong-hwan/Police Chief Cho Ji-ho's Attorney/Dec. 13: "He refused to locate the politicians, and also rejected the president's orders to arrest members of the National Assembly six times..."]

However, the results of the prosecution's investigation were different.

The prosecution's indictment against Police Chief Cho Ji-ho reveals that during the martial law, an official from the Defense Counterintelligence Command requested Lee Hyun-il, investigation planning section chief of the National Office of Investigation, to "send police officers to the National Assembly as we need to form an arrest team," mentioning that the targets for arrest were "Lee Jae-myung and Han Dong-hoon."

The prosecution also believes that after this information was reported to Chief Cho, the National Office of Investigation sent a list of detectives to the Counterintelligence Command.

Lee Hyun-il, identified as the recipient of the request from the Counterintelligence Command, strongly denied ever hearing about the arrest targets, stating, "It is not true," while the Counterintelligence Command told KBS today (1.16), "We testified as stated in the prosecution's indictment."

Additionally, the indictment contains specific details regarding Chief Cho's instructions related to the police's control over the access to the National Assembly during the martial law.

Although there were reports that completely blocking access for lawmakers to the National Assembly could be unconstitutional, Chief Cho allegedly dismissed these concerns by saying, "If we do not follow the martial law decree, we will all be arrested. Follow the orders," according to the prosecution.

This is KBS News, Yoon Bom-i.