Seoul Mayor Park Won-soon reported missing, search underway
Seoul, Jul 9 (efe-epa).- The mayor of Seoul Park Won-soon was reported missing on Thursday and a search operation is underway, South Korean authorities said.
Police deployed a search for the mayor using drones and dogs after his family reported his disappearance.
Sources from the City Council of the South Korean capital told Efe that “there is no news” of 64-year-old Park’s whereabouts.
The mayor’s daughter Park Da-hee denounced the disappearance at around 17.17 local time Thursday (08.17 GMT) saying that her father “had left home four to five hours ago after leaving words like a will, with his phone currently off,” Yonhap news agency reported.
The City Council had previously announced the cancellation of a scheduled event at 16.40 local time (07:40 GMT) in which Park was scheduled to participate.
Park, born in 1956 in Changnyeong, in the South Gyeongsang Province (southeast of the country), has been mayor since 2011 and is very popular.
He is currently serving his third consecutive term.
He won his first term in 2011 as an independent candidate before joining President Moon Jae-in’s liberal Democratic Party in 2012.
Liberals were considering Park as a presidential candidate for the 2022 elections.
As a former pro-democracy and human rights activist, Park is a unique and much-loved figure on the South Korean political scene. EFE-EPA
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