Source:
Straits TimesSEOUL - EMBATTLED former President Roh Moo Hyun - a reformist shamed by a corruption scandal that tarnished his image as a 'clean' politician - jumped to his death while hiking in the mountains behind his rural home in South Korea, his lawyer said. He was 62.
Mr Roh was hiking in Bongha village when he threw himself off a steep cliff around 6.40am on Saturday, lawyer Moon Jae In told reporters in the southern city of Busan. He said Mr Roh left a suicide note.
A self-taught lawyer who lifted himself out of poverty to reach the nation's highest office, Mr Roh prided himself on his clean record in a country with a long history of corruption. He served as president from 2003 to 2008. But he and his family have been ensnared in recent weeks in a burgeoning bribery scandal.
The suicide - the first by a South Korean president - stunned the nation. South Koreans nationwide huddled around TV screens watching news broadcasts.
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http://www.straitstimes.com/Breaking%2BNews/Asia/Story/STIStory_380659.html?vgnmr=1
Background from Straits Times
http://www.straitstimes.com/Breaking%2BNews/Asia/Story/BgSty_380659_2.htmlBorn on August 6, 1946 to a poor family near the south-eastern city of Gimhae, he left school early but took odd jobs and studied at night to escape rural poverty.
He chose the law as his path but found his true voice as a politician defending the oppressed against the army-backed dictatorship of the mid-1980s.
Mr Roh's life changed in 1981 when he met dissident students whose toenails had been torn off during two months of torture for possessing banned literature.
He built his reputation defending students accused of sedition under previous military-backed administrations, and once was arrested and his law license suspended for supporting an outlawed labour protest.
He challenged the authority of President Chun Doo Hwan, and made headlines in 1987 when he was jailed and suspended from his law practice on charges of abetting striking shipyard workers.
Amid nationwide protests that year which ushered in democracy, Mr Roh became a full-time politician.
He was elected to parliament in 1988 and won fame in his first year during a parliamentary hearing on the past wrongdoings of Chun's government, when he spoke out against the dictatorship and cross-questioned witnesses.
In the early 1990s he backed a petition calling for US troops to leave Korea.
Mr Roh scored a dramatic upset victory in the 2002 presidential election, partly by harnessing the power of the Internet to swell support.
After inauguration in early 2003, he described his priorities as the emergence of his country as an East Asian economic and technological hub and reconciliation with communist North Korea.
He also sought a policy of 'balanced diplomacy' by lessening dependence on long-time ally the United States.
Mr Roh pushed a generally liberal agenda, calling for a fairer distribution of wealth and characterising himself as a fighter for the underprivileged.
But his aggressive and provocative remarks, coupled with a lack of skill in building political ties, often led to confrontations.
After a year in office, Mr Roh became the first South Korean president to be impeached for an alleged breach of election laws. He survived the impeachment and propelled his party to a sweeping victory in general elections in 2004.
Mr Roh deserved praise for breaking the deep-rooted relationship between politicians and traditional power-holders by reducing the power of the conservative media and conglomerates, said Choi Jin, a Korea University professor.
But he was also faulted for economic mismanagement.
In February 2007 he quit the Uri party he had helped found, apparently acknowledging he had become a political liability in a presidential election year.
By the end of his single five-year term the popularity of Mr Roh and his liberal supporters was low.
Conservative Lee Myung Bak heavily defeated the liberal candidate in the December 2007 presidential poll.
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