Old TV interview misrepresented as ex-South Korea president Moon Jae-in defending wife's India visit

The release of former South Korean president Moon Jae-in's memoir has reignited a long-standing controversy about his wife's trip to India while he was in power. But social media posts -- sharing a screenshot of an unrelated interview -- have misleadingly suggested he went on television to defend her. Although Moon hit back at his critics in a public Facebook post, saying attempts to denigrate her trip were "pathetic and embarrassing", he has not discussed it on television as of June 20, 2024.

"Moon making excuses saying [his wife Kim Jung-sook's] Taj Mahal tourist trip shouldn't be criticised," read a Korean-language Facebook post shared on June 17.

It showed a picture of Moon giving an interview to NewsA Live from South Korean broadcaster Channel A.

The caption reads: "Why are they criticising this? It is not an issue to be criticised."

South Korean prosecutors launched a probe into allegations that Moon's wife Kim Jung-sook invited herself to a diplomatic trip to India in November 2018, which Moon recently called "the first standalone diplomacy by a first lady" in his recently published memoir (archived links here and here).

South Korea's ruling and opposition parties have traded barbs over the issue, with Moon calling the claims "pathetic and embarrassing" attempts to denigrate the trip (archived link).

The image was shared widely in Facebook groups in South Korea, including here, here and here.

Some social media users appeared to believe it showed Moon speaking on TV about his wife's India trip.

"He's crawling back onto the airwaves now," wrote one user.

However, there were no official reports that Moon spoke about his wife's India trip in a television interview as of June 20.

The image shared in the Facebook posts actually shows Moon defending his administration's policy toward North Korea in a 2022 interview.

Misrepresented interview

A keyword search for captions from the image found a Channel A report from April 27, 2022 about a TV interview Moon gave to broadcaster JTBC the previous day (archived links here and here).

Below is a screenshot comparison between the image shared in false Facebook posts (left) and Channel A's report in April 2022 (right):

The report focused on the interviewer's probing Moon on criticism of his administration's ultimately unsuccessful diplomatic outreach to North Korea -- which culminated in Pyongyang's public demolition of a liaison office between the two governments on its soil.

To that question, Moon responded: "Why are they criticising? This isn't an issue to be criticised. There are a lot of regrets with the way talks did not pan out, but the process shouldn't be criticised."

He went on to defend his administration's record in preventing military conflict with North Korea, pointing to a string of tense incidents under his conservative predecessors, who pursued a hardline policy toward Pyongyang.

Nowhere in his 77-minute interview with JTBC did Moon bring up his wife's India trip.

Reports on Moon's memoirs, including here and here, noted they were his first public recognition of his wife's controversial India visit (archived links here and here).