Officials from the Seoul Central District Prosecutors' Office on Tuesday will visit Park at the detention center since she refused to come to the court citing health problems and will question her about $3.7 million the NIS allegedly offered to Park's office between 2013 and mid-2016, the Yonhap news agency reported, adding that the prosecutors would also ask the former president about the purpose the money was spent for.
The interrogation follows the November statement of Nam Jae-joon, the first NIS director under President Park, claiming that he had been transferring about 50 million won ($46,500) to the president's office every month, and the prosecutors suspect that the monthly payment increased later to about 100 million won.
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Park has been engulfed in the political scandal since late October 2016, when media reported that she allowed her close associate Choi Soon-sil, who did not hold any official post, to get involved in state affairs. The investigation into the issue has resulted in the Park’s impeachment in December 2016 and arrest, extended on October 13, over corruption accusations, involving 13 different cases of bribery, coercion and abuse of power.
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The former president is the daughter of Park Chung-hee, a military dictator who became President in the 1960s and helped kick off South Korea's phenomenal economic success, but was assassinated by the then head of the KCIA in 1979, remaining, however, the most popular president in the history of South Korea.
