US suspends prosecution of former CIA analyst Sue Mi Terry — Channel NewsAsia
In the United States, the Department of Justice has agreed to suspend the criminal prosecution of former CIA analyst and White House National Security Council official Sue Mi Terry. She was accused of working as an unregistered agent for South Korea. As Channel NewsAsia reports, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York will suspend the charges brought by a grand jury in July 2024.
Terms of the agreement
Under the deferred prosecution agreement, the case will be permanently closed after 12 months if Terry complies with the specified conditions. These include restrictions on travel and contact with the South Korean government.
The terms are set out in a four-page notice filed on Tuesday with the U.S. District Court in Manhattan. The Department of Justice did not provide detailed reasons for the decision, stating only that deferring the prosecution would best serve the interests of the United States and Terry.
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Nature of the accusations
The indictment alleged that Terry received gifts from the South Korean government in exchange for promoting Seoul’s positions, providing non-public information to South Korean intelligence officers, and facilitating contacts between South Korean officials and their U.S. counterparts. According to investigators, her unregistered activities in the interests of South Korea continued from 2013 for ten years.
Terry did not admit to wrongdoing. At the same time, as part of the agreement, she confirmed that she assisted South Korean intelligence officers, including by providing them with notes for a 2022 meeting between senior U.S. State Department officials and experts on Korean policy.
She also confirmed receiving from South Korean intelligence representatives designer handbags worth more than $9,200, 19 lunches at expensive restaurants, and $37,000 in payments for a Korean policy program that she ran. The indictment included allegations of violating the Foreign Agents Registration Act and conspiring to violate it.
