South Korean scandals

This is a list of major political scandals in South Korea:
International Scandals
1970s
* 1973
:* Kidnapping of Kim Dae-jung - August 8 - after self-exiling himself to Japan following an assassination attempt, Kim Dae-jung was anaesthetised into unconsciousness before he was moved to Osaka, Japan and later to Seoul, South Korea.
* 1976
:* Koreagate - an American political scandal in 1976 involving South Koreans seeking influence with members of Congress.
1980s
* 1980
:* Gwangju massacre - May 1980 - after the Coup d'état of December Twelfth (1979) in Seoul, then-General Chun Doo-hwan ordered the armed suppression of a student-turned-general population mass demonstration of 300,000 citizens of Gwangju, South Cholla Province. Although the official investigation by the civilian government in the 1990s found the number of civilians confirmed dead to be 207, a number of domestic and international studies have suggested that up to one to two thousand had died. There have been those who argue that the United States was complicit in the massacre.
2000s
* 2003
:* Cash-for-summit scandal - Although the historic North-South summit between the two Koreas was held in June 2000, the scandal broke in 2003 when it was revealed that the Kim Dae Jung Administration secretly sent millions of dollars to North Korea to secure the landmark summit with Hyundai Asan as the conduit.
* 2005
:* Hwang Woo Suk - discredited Seoul National University scientist who made fraudulent claims in 2004 about creating the world's first stem cells from a cloned human embryo.
* 2006
:* Tongsun Park - charged with secretly acting as an agent for Saddam Hussein's regime to enrich himself, U.N. and Iraqi officials under the United Nations' Oil for food program.
National Scandals
1970s
* 1973
:* Tsche Chong-kil - It was confirmed in 2002 by the Presidential Truth Commission on Suspicious Deaths that Seoul National University law professor Tsche Chong Kil was taken to the Korean Central Intelligence Agency and thrown off a fire exit after investigators mistook him for dead when he lost consciousness while being tortured. The original official announcement had been that Tsche had confessed to being a North Korean spy and jumped to his death.
1990s
* 1994
:* Seongsu Bridge collapse () - on October 21, 1994, the Seongsu Bridge collapsed killing 32 people and injuring 17 others. The structural collapse was due to one of the concrete slabs failing, mainly because the bridge was not welded properly.
* 1995
:* Sampoong Department Store collapse () - on June 29, 1995, the Sampoong Department Store (Seocho-gu, Seoul) collapsed killing 501 people and injuring 937 more. It was revealed that corners were cut on building materials, building codes were disregarded, bribes were given to city inspectors, and early warning signs of imminent collapse (including on the day of collapse) were ignored. Those jailed included Lee Joon (the building owner), his son (the store's president), several city officials, Sampoong Department Store executives, and the building company responsible for completing the building.
:* Slush Fund Scandal - In October 1995, it was disclosed that former President Roh Tae Woo had collected political donations from businesses as contributions to his (secret) governing fund while holding public office between 1988 and 1993. Five heads of chaebol, among them the chairmen of Daewoo and Samsung, received two-and-a-half-year suspended sentences for paying bribes to Roh (and his predecessor Chun Doo Hwan) during the presidential term in exchange for favors.
* 1999
:* Daewoo scandal - The Daewoo group collapsed in August 1999 under $80 billion of debt, leaving local banks with huge unpaid debts. Implicated were Daewoo founder Kim Woo Choong and many of his top executives.
2000s
* 2000
:* Baek Ji Young scandal - November 19 - Korean singer Baek Ji Young burst onto the Korean pop charts in 1999 but a raunchy videotape of Baek in a bedroom romp with her former manager surfaced on the internet, resulting in the manager fleeing to America
* 2005
:* X-file scandal - revolves around the release of wiretapped conversations to the media.
:* Hong Seok-hyun - former ambassador to the United States, from December 2004 until his resignation on July 26, 2005 due to revelations that he was involved in a 1997 scheme by Samsung to bribe various politicians including Grand National Party leader Lee Hoi-chang, by providing financial support to them in the 1997 South Korean presidential election.
* 2007
:* Shin Jeong-ah diploma forgery scandal - It was disclosed in July 2007 that Shin Jeong-Ah, the newly appointed director of the 2008 Gwangju Biennale and Dongguk University assistant professor of art, had falsified her educational credentials. This led to a cascading effect in South Korea of the outing of other academians and famous people who had also falsified their educational credentials. This story was made into a 2011 korean drama named "Miss Ripley".

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