The former head of the country’s largest power equipment maker was grilled by prosecutors Friday on suspicion of bribing a former presidential secretary in exchange for providing business favors to a local university he owns.
Park Yong-sung, the former chairman of Doosan Heavy Industries & Construction Co., is suspected of providing kickbacks worth 100 million won ($92,000) to Park Beom-hun, who is accused of peddling influence for Chung-Ang University (CAU) in Seoul between 2011 and 2012.
Prosecutors at the Seoul Central Prosecutors’ Office allege that Doosan’s Park was directly involved in the bribery.
Park Beom-hun, senior presidential secretary for education and culture under the previous Lee Myung-bak administration, has been detained over allegations of pressuring the Ministry of Education into approving illegal projects proposed by CAU.
Park headed the university before joining the presidential office.
He is accused of helping CAU combine its campuses in Seoul and Anseong, Gyeonggi Province, even though they are further apart than the legal limit of 20 kilometers. (Yonhap)
