South Korea’s Lee says claim that minister leaked classified intel is ‘absurd’

SEOUL, April 21 (Reuters) – South Korean President Lee Jae Myung has rejected as “absurd” claims that his minister overseeing relations with North Korea revealed classified information provided by the U.S. on Pyongyang’s nuclear facilities.

South Korean media have reported the U.S. has stopped sharing some intelligence on North Korea partly because Unification Minister Chung Dong-young spoke publicly about a previously unconfirmed uranium enrichment facility in the country.

Chung and his ministry have said his March comments about the facility in an area called Kusong in North Korea were based on publicly available information, including research reports.

“It’s a clear fact that the existence of the Kusong nuclear facility was widely known globally even before Chung’s public comments through various research reports and news media,” Lee said in a post on X late on Monday.

“Any claim or action based on the idea that Minister Chung ‘leaked classified information provided by the U.S.’ is wrong. I’ll be looking closely into why something as absurd as this is happening,” he said.

South Korea’s defence ministry declined on Tuesday to comment on any change to intelligence sharing by the U.S. but said the two countries’ intelligence authorities were working closely together, including on North Korean missile launches.

North Korea conducted its latest ballistic missile tests on Sunday, which were tracked by South Korea and Japan. 

Chung told a parliamentary committee last month that North Korea had been enriching weapons-grade uranium at Kusong as well as in previously confirmed or suspected sites in Yongbyon and Kangson.

Yonhap news agency reported on Tuesday that the U.S. had limited sharing of some intelligence gathered from spy satellites.

Some opposition politicians have called for Chung’s dismissal, saying he has damaged Seoul’s alliance with the U.S. The two countries have a defence treaty and the U.S. has a major military presence in the country, including 28,500 troops.

(Reporting by Jack Kim; Editing by Kate Mayberry)