Lee Kwan-sup, senior presidential secretary for policy planning, speaks during a briefing at the presidential office in Yongsan, Seoul, Wednesday. Yonhap

By Lee Hyo-jin

The Yoon Suk-yeol administration vowed on Wednesday to tighten monitoring of the accounting systems of civic groups that receive government subsidies to ensure transparency in their financial management.

The government, in particular, focused on the fact that the amount of subsidies offered to nonprofit organizations saw a substantial increase during the previous Moon Jae-in administration, adding that it will look further into possible accounting irregularities.

The presidential office disclosed the results of an interim inspection on the use of state funds provided to private civic groups nationwide, which revealed dozens of cases of audit fraud and misuse of funds over the last seven years.

"Improving transparency in the use of government subsidies of nonprofit civic organizations had been selected as one of the key tasks of the Yoon Suk-yeol government," senior presidential secretary for policy planning Lee Kwan-sup said during a briefing. "We have conducted the investigation, based on which we will come up with improvement measures."

He stated that the probe, conducted over the last two months, was spurred by a corruption scandal surrounding the Korean Council for Justice and Remembrance for the Issues of Military Sexual Slavery by Japan, a civic group dedicated to supporting survivors of sex slavery. The organization made headlines in 2020 for its alleged accounting malpractice and embezzlement.