South Korean prosecutors made an
effort to probe a main opposition party lawmaker, Rep. Kim Nam-kuk of the
Democratic Party, over some crypto transactions he allegedly made last year.
However, they faced a stumbling block when the Seoul Southern District Court
rejected their request for a warrant to examine the lawmaker’s financial
record, Yonhap News Agency reports.
According to the South Korean
news agency’s sources, the court dismissed the request on the ground that the lawmaker’s
crypto holding did not require criminal investigation. Prosecutors, however, said
they will consider making another effort to secure a search warrant, according to the
sources.
The prosecutors’ probe is based
on information received from the South Korea Financial Services Commission’s
Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU). Kim reportedly had about 800,000 WEMIX coins
in his crypto wallet between January and February 2022. The coins were worth
about six billion won ($4.5 million) at the time.
On March 25, 2022, South Korea
implemented the travel rule of the Financial Action Task Force, a global money
laundering and terrorist financing watchdog. The rule requires digital
exchanges to store and report personal data on transactions that exceed a
certain threshold.
In implementing the rule, South
Korea required exchanges in the country to disclose the identity of entities
and transactions worth over one million won. However, Kim allegedly withdrew all
his coins before the rule came into force.
Kim Denies Breaking the Law
Furthermore, Yonhap reports that
South Korea law requires top government officials to disclose their regular
assets to the public; the country, however, has no provision in this regard for digital
assets. Kim also said he did not take out his tokens or contravene any law,
according to CoinDesk.
In July 2021, Kim in
collaboration with another lawmaker spearheaded a call for amendment to South
Korea’s Income Tax Act, including the postponement of taxation on crypto assets, among other proposals. The
take-off date for the 20% tax on crypto earnings was later moved to 2025.
Meanwhile, in December last
year, a court in Seoul dismissed an injunction filed by game developer WeMade
against four South Korea crypto exchanges, to stop them from delisting its
WEMIX coins from their platforms. In November, the exchanges under the aegis of the Digital Asset eXchange Association (DAXA)
had announced plans to delist to the coin, allegedly that the firm…
