3 Defendants Added to Korea Bribery Scandal

SEOUL, South Korea — Daewoo Group Chairman Kim Woo Choong and two other South Korean industrialists were indicted over the weekend on bribery charges, prosecutors said.

The others are Dong-A Construction Group Chairman Choi Won Suk and Samsung Engineering & Construction Chairman Park Ki Suk. They weren’t detained physically.

Prosecutors said Chung Hun Mok, former chairman of Hyundai Engineering & Construction, will be investigated on the same charge when he returns from his stay in the United States.

The officials said an extensive probe found that the bribery case, which emerged early this month with the arrest of a former cabinet minister, was broader than originally thought.

Initially, Samsung and Hyundai were not included in the scandal. But former Trade and Industry Minister Ahn Byung Hwa confessed to receiving an additional $375,000 each from the two companies in 1992, in exchange for special favors in the awarding of government projects, prosecutors said.

Ahn had admitted taking $250,000 each from Daewoo’s Kim, Dong-A’s Choi and former Korean representative of the state-run Atomic Energy of Canada Ltd. in 1991, when was president of the Korea Electric Power Corp.