A "new political row has broken out in South Korea" claiming that Samsung Chair Lee Kun-hee received a special pardon in '09 so that he could "play a crucial role in Pyeongchang's successful bid" for the Olympics in return for "financially helping a company" with links to the country's president at the time, Lee Myung-bak, according to Duncan Mackay of INSIDE THE GAMES. Lee Kun-hee had been found guilty in '08 of "being responsible for a Samsung slush fund used to bribe influential prosecutors, judges and political figures in South Korea." A court in Seoul fined him 110B won and sentenced him to a suspended jail term of three years. As a result of the sentence, he was suspended by the IOC. After his suspension was lifted, Lee "went on to play a leading role" in the Pyeongchang 2018 bid. South Korean prosecutors are now investigating allegations that Samsung "paid billions of won in litigation fees on behalf of DAS," the local auto firm that is suspected to have created a "multi-billion-won slush fund for Lee" (INSIDE THE GAMES, 2/21).
THE LATEST TWIST: In N.Y., Harris & Sang-Hun reported U.S. VP Mike Pence "had planned to secretly meet with a high-level delegation of North Korean leaders" while he was at the Winter Olympics in South Korea this month, but the North Koreans "canceled at the last minute," according to the U.S. State Department. Heather Nauert, the department's spokesperson, said, "We regret the failure to seize this opportunity." The canceled meeting is the "latest twist in the evolving American strategy to persuade North Korea to give up its nuclear and missile programs." It also adds a "remarkable coda to the strange tableau during the opening ceremony" of Pence sitting in a reviewing stand less than 10 feet away from Kim Yo-jong, the sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, as the two "stared fixedly ahead without acknowledging each other" (N.Y. TIMES, 2/20).
