Impeached South Korean President Park Geun-hye held a rare press conference on the first day of the New Year on Sunday, denying all allegations on her involvement in the influence-peddling scandal that led to her impeachment.
The meeting with local journalists was the first since President Park was impeached in the parliament on Dec. 9.
It was rare for Park to meet with the press corps dedicating to the coverage of the presidential Blue House for her four years in office.
During the meeting, the first South Korean female leader actively denied all allegations surrounding her, including the bribery charges to support last year's merger of two affiliates of Samsung Group, South Korea's largest family-run conglomerate.
The merger between Cheil Industries and Samsung C&T to create a de-facto holding company of the group was extremely crucial to Samsung Electronics Vice Chairman Lee Jae-yong to inherit a management control from his father Chairman Lee Kun-hee who has been hospitalized for over two and a half years for heart attack.
Former health and welfare minister Moon Hyung-pyo has been detained by the independent counsel team as he was charged with pressuring the national pension fund into voting for the Samsung merger on the instruction of the presidential office.
Samsung is suspected of having bribed the president and her longtime confidante Choi Soon-sil in exchange for the support in the merger.
It was the biggest donor to two nonprofit foundations controlled by Choi and offered funds for equestrian training of Choi's daughter.
Park told reporters that prosecutors entangled her in the bribery allegation though she had no intention to aid the Samsung merger, saying she had never given any orders to support it.
Despite strong opposition from foreign investors to the merger and pessimistic reports from outside advisors on the unfair merger ratio, the National Pension Service (NPS), then biggest shareholder of Samsung C&T, approved the extremely significant merger for the Samsung heir.
The impeached president emphasized local brokerages having supported the merger, but the local securities firms are suspected of having been pressured by Samsung into issuing positive reports on the merger.
Park also denied rumors on her whereabouts when the Sewol ferry sank in southwestern waters on April 16, 2014, claiming over 300 lives, mostly high school students.
The Park administration has been under fire for its initial bungling of rescue operations in the devastating disaster, stoking speculations that President Park had disappeared for about seven hours after the incident occurred.
The impeached president said she stayed in the presidential residence at the time to normally receive reports on the incident and give necessary orders for rescue operations. Park noted that she had done what she must do.
Touching on the alleged intervention of her decades-long friend in government affairs, Park said it's an impossible story for Choi Soon-sil to pull all government strings behind the scene though Choi is her longtime acquaintance.
The president said she had managed state affairs with her own philosophy and belief as chief executive.
Choi is suspected of editing presidential speeches, including the most important one made in Dresden, Germany in 2014 to outline the Park government's DPRK policy, while receiving secret presidential documents on a regular basis to meddle in state affairs.
Seoul's decision to shut down the inter-Korean factory park in the DPRK's border town of Kaesong is suspected of having been made by Choi's advice.
The shutdown was a retaliation against Pyongyang's fourth nuclear test and a long-range rocket launch in early 2016.
Park expressed her complaint about too many distorted media speculations over the scandal, saying those false accusations have gotten out of control.
