February 24, 2025
SEOUL – A list of politicians who President Yoon Suk Yeol allegedly ordered to be arrested has been at the center of the president’s impeachment trial this month along with the whistleblower who disclosed it as crucial evidence. Hong Jang-won, one of 16 witnesses summoned in Yoon’s impeachment, which began on Jan. 14, is the only figure who has been called into the Constitutional Court twice.
As a graduate of the 43rd class of the Korea Military Academy, Hong worked as South Korea’s top spy specializing in overseas intelligence and North Korea for over 30 years.
After serving in the military as a counterterrorism expert in the 707th Special Mission Group, a general-purpose special forces unit of the Republic of Korea Army Special Warfare Command, he became a black operative in the National Intelligence Service, steadily rising through its ranks.
After serving as the NIS chief secretary and special advisor on North Korea, Hong revealed that he had left the agency before returning in November 2023, when he was appointed by President Yoon as NIS deputy director, a vice minister-level position.
Hong appeared in court again on Thursday after the president’s legal team raised concerns about the credibility of his testimony. Hong’s testimony given on Feb. 4 drew significant attention as he claimed that Yoon ordered him to arrest key political figures on the night of the short-lived martial law declaration on Dec. 3.
“Take this opportunity to round them (the lawmakers) all up. The NIS will be given counterespionage authority, so for now, assist the Defense Counterintelligence Command (in doing so),” Yoon told him, according to Hong.
Hong’s detailed testimony was considered key evidence in the claim that Yoon had issued an unlawful order to arrest politicians.
Four versions of the memo
Hong has testified that Yoon called him directly that night — a claim Yoon’s lawyers have rejected, arguing that there is “no reason that the president would directly call the deputy chief rather than the NIS director.”
But Yoon later admitted that he called to “check whether Hong was cooperating well with Defense Counterintelligence Command. The then-DCC chief was Hong’s junior in the army, so I called to encourage him to help them well,” Yoon said.
According to Hong, soon after Yoon called him at 10:53 p.m., he received a call from then-DCC chief Yeo In-hyeong, who listed the names of the people to be arrested that night.
“‘Is he insane?’ I thought, and then I stopped writing (people’s names) during the call,” Hong testified in court on Feb. 4, recalling his reaction as he heard the names.
“Lee Jae-myung, Woo Won-shik, Han Dong-hoon, Park Chan-dae, Cho Kook…” Hong listed the names without hesitance when Yoon’s lawyer asked who they were.
However, NIS Director Cho Tae-yong — Hong’s boss — raised strong doubts about the veracity of the alleged note during his own testimony as a witness on Feb. 13.
“I’ve checked the surveillance camera footage,” Cho told the court, adding that Hong was in his office at the time when he claims he was near Cho’s official residence.
Hong on Thursday admitted to a “slight error” in his memory.
“I thought (where I wrote down the note) was in an open space in front of (NIS Director Cho Tae-yong’s) official residence. … But when I reviewed my memory, I realized that the moment when during a phone call when I was given the list of politicians to be arrested was at 10:58 p.m., and I wrote down the list at 11:06 p.m. inside my office,” he corrected himself.
“But (the two locations) are only three minutes apart … does it really matter where I wrote down the list?” Hong asked the court.
Cho also mentioned that there are four different versions of the notes, suggesting the possibility of fabrication.
According to Hong, during the fifth hearing held on Feb. 5, the note he had “hurriedly jotted down was later transcribed by” his aide, implying that there were two different versions: the original note written by himself and the one his aide transcribed on the same day.
But on Feb. 13, Cho testified that there were actually four versions of the note, including a third note that Hong asked his aide on Dec. 4 to write down again based on the aide’s memory, and a fourth note, whose author he didn’t specify, which had more names than the third note.
This prompted Hong to bring a physical copy of the memo to court on Thursday, reiterating his original argument that “the list existed.”
Yoon and Hong
While Yoon’s team grilled Hong about having recorded the names on paper and attacked his “political motives” for doing so, Hong said he was “curious” why the DCC had attempted to arrest politicians.
“It is a list of people whom the counterintelligence agency attempted to arrest during the period of emergency martial law. I left a note as a way to remember, thinking that I should at least know the number of people on that list,” Hong said, adding that the number was between 14 and 16.
Yoon’s lawyer Yoon Kab-keun fired back at him, asking, “Why bother to remember the list? What is your intention?”
Hong asked back: “The intelligence agency wants to know many kinds of information. Do they always need to have a meaning?”
At the end of Hong’s witness examination on Thursday, the court’s acting Chief Justice Moon Hyung-bae asked Hong what kind of relationship he had with Yoon — focusing on doubts about the claim that Yoon made a call to Hong on the night of Dec. 3 rather than to NIS chief Cho.
“I served him with the utmost loyalty.”
Yoon, frowning, raised his voice.
“It is problematic to connect a call between me and Hong with a fabricated ‘presidential order to arrest politicians’ and an insurrection plot,” Yoon told the court.
Leaving the courthouse, Hong remained low-key in front of reporters.
“A lot has happened, and the relationship between (the president and I) has changed, I do not want to so easily judge someone I once served. Let’s leave it at that,” Hong told reporters.
On Jan. 22, Hong appeared at the National Assembly’s special impeachment committee hearing and testified that he “liked the president.”
“I wanted to do everything that he might ask me to do. But looking at that list (of the politicians to arrest), it was something I could not bear. … Isn’t it wrong for the Republic of Korea to do this?”
Yoon’s impeachment trial is set to hold its final and 11th hearing on Tuesday. Both Yoon and the National Assembly, which is prosecuting the trial, will have unlimited time for their final arguments. The final verdict is expected to be handed down around March 11.