Opposition leader Lee Jae-myung urged President Yoon Suk Yeol on Thursday to fire Ambassador to Australia Lee Jong-sup and ban him from leaving the country after the envoy returned home amid growing pressure to come back for an investigation.

The ambassador returned home earlier in the day, 11 days after he took up the top envoy post, as criticism has been mounting over his appointment and departure when he is subject to an ongoing investigation for allegedly interfering in a military probe into a Marine’s death last year.

“The president should fire Ambassador Lee Jong-sup immediately and ban him from leaving the country,” Lee, the leader of the main opposition Democratic Party (DP), said during a party meeting in the southern city of Gwangju, calling the ambassador “a key suspect.”

Lee charged that the government used power to steal a suspect out of the country by naming him an ambassador, and demanded a thorough investigation into those responsible for Lee’s departure and due punishment for them.

The DP
made the same call again.

“The appointment of the suspect Lee Jong-sup is wrong per se,” DP floor leader Hong Ihk-pyo said in a press briefing at the National Assembly.

“Given that he is in a situation where he can no longer serve his duty as ambassador, President Yoon Suk Yeol must dismiss him immediately,” Hong said.

Hong also called on the Corruption Investigation Office for High-ranking Officials (CIO) in charge of the probe to delve into the truth about the presidential office’s involvement in the case.

Hong refuted ruling party chief Han Dong-hoon’s earlier remarks about how Lee’s return home has “resolved everything.”

“Nothing has been resolved,” Hong said.

Source: Yonhap News Agency