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| Members of the National Assembly claim that John Lee intentionally bought time during a parliamentary audit of the company Monday. Yonhap |
By Dong Sun-hwa
Korean-American Google Korea CEO John Lee has been accused of using his inability to speak Korean fluently as a delaying tactic during a National Assembly inspection Monday.
The National Assembly Science, ICT, Broadcasting, and Communications Committee called Lee as a witness in regard to Google's alleged tax evasion and YouTube's alleged fake videos. It was the second time the committee had called on Lee, following the first, Oct. 10, when he merely repeatedly answered, "I do not know," and "I cannot say that."
Lee's latest responses were not so different from his previous appearance.
As an interpreter was used for every question, the response time for Lee was curtailed.
"The CEO is known to use Korean fluently at home but why here (is he not so fluent) … How can he behave like this despite living with Koreans?" Noh Woong-rae from the ruling Democratic Party of Korea asked.
"I heard that Lee has a lot of drinking parties with Koreans, and that he is good at swearing at people using Korean," said Kim Kyung-jin from the Party for Democracy and Peace. "But now he is spending so long waiting for interpretation, it is allowing us only one question."
Rep. Kim also said there should be an adjustment to the audit procedure for witnesses from foreign-affiliated firms.
"The national inspection is fruitless if only five minutes is given for a question, interpretation and answer," Kim said.
Lee said he can have basic conversations in Korean but needed an interpreter this time because the content was complex.
