The floor leaders of Korea's main political parties met this morning to try and narrow their differences on a number of issues -- one of them being a scandal involving the manipulation of online comments.
But despite an apparent concession from the ruling Democratic Party of Korea, the deadlock continues.
Park Hee-jun has the details. South Korea's National Assembly has failed again to end a deadlock that's lasted over a month.
The floor leaders of the main negotiation blocs met Monday morning... to look for a compromise on issues including an online opinion-rigging scandal and parliamentary ratification of the Panmunjom Declaration.
The discussion was joined by Woo Won-sik of the ruling Democratic Party of Korea, Kim Sung-tae of the main opposition Liberty Korea Party, Kim Dong-cheol of the centrist Bareun Mirae Party, and Roh Hoe-chan representing both the Justice Party and the Party for Democracy and Peace.
The biggest conflict was over the scandal, in which an influential blogger is said to have used a computer program to boost the number of "likes" for online comments critical of the current Moon Jae-in administration.
And a former lawmaker of the ruling party is suspected to have connections with the blogger.
The Liberty Korea Party has been demanding an investigation by an independent counsel,... something the Democratic Party of Korea had refused but finally conceded on Monday -- on the condition that Parliament simultaneously consider an extra budget bill on the 24th of this month.
But the Liberty Korea Party insisted that the probe has to begin first,... dashing hopes of a breakthrough.
"We made this compromise, and still they disagreed. They must have other intentions or they may have wrecked everything on purpose."
"The Liberty Korea Party and the Bareun Mirae Party won't accept anything that they don't want. Their stubbornness led to today's failure."
National Assembly Speaker Chung Sye-Kyun has set a deadline of Tuesday at 2 PM for the parties to get things moving again -- in consideration of the June local elections... and the fact that the ruling party will elect a new floor leader this week.
That leaves less than a day for the parties to continue their hasty negotatiations... with a last-minute deal still possibly on the table.
Park Hee-jun, Arirang News.
