Plaintiff (Law Firm Gael, Attorneys Lee Jin-jin et al., Counsel for plaintiff-appellant)

Director of the National Intelligence Service (Attorney Sung-soo, Counsel for defendant-appellant)

May 20, 2010

Seoul Administrative Court Decision 2009Guhap6629 Decided September 24, 2009

1.The judgment of the first instance shall be modified as follows:

A. We dismiss the part of the instant lawsuit seeking revocation of the disposition of non-disclosure of information set forth in attached Tables 2, 3, 4, and 5 among the information lists.

B. The plaintiff's remaining claims are dismissed.

2. All costs of the lawsuit shall be borne by the Plaintiff.

The judgment of the first instance shall be revoked. The defendant's disposition of non-disclosure of information on the information listed in the separate sheet against the plaintiff on June 2, 2008 (the part of the case concerning "the benefits before the Ministry of Public Administration and Security, the amount of deduction, and the details of deduction" in paragraph (1) of the attached list of information listed in the separate sheet of the first instance judgment was revoked (the case was rejected by the court of first instance but the plaintiff did not appeal against

1. Details of the disposition;

A. On May 23, 2008, the Plaintiff filed a claim with the Defendant for disclosure of each information described in the separate sheet concerning the Nonparty of the staff member of the National Intelligence Service (hereinafter “National Intelligence Service”) in the divorce proceeding with the Plaintiff.

B. On June 2, 2008, the Defendant rendered the instant disposition rejecting disclosure against the Plaintiff on the grounds that the said information constitutes information subject to non-disclosure pursuant to Article 9(1)1, 3, and 6 of the Official Information Disclosure Act and Article 12 of the National Intelligence Service Act.

[Ground for Recognition: Facts without dispute, entry of Gap evidence 9-1, purport of the whole pleadings]

2. Whether the part of a lawsuit seeking the revocation of a decision to disclose information specified in attached Tables 2, 3, 4, and 5 is legitimate

In light of the fact that the information disclosure system is a system that discloses information held and managed by a public institution in its state, it is sufficient for a person who seeks information disclosure to prove that there is a considerable probability that the person who seeks information disclosure will hold and manage the information that is sought by an administrative agency. However, unless there are special circumstances, there is no legal interest to seek revocation of a disposition rejecting information disclosure (see Supreme Court Decision 2003Du9459, Jan. 13, 2006, etc.).

The defendant asserts that the information listed in the attached list 2, 3, 4, and 5 that the plaintiff sought disclosure is not owned and managed by the defendant (it is understood that the part of the information listed in the above paragraph (5) refers to one different from the one already disclosed in the court of first instance, i.e., the one that is the one that is the one that is the one that is the one that is the one that is the one that is the one that is the one that is the one that is the one that is the one that is the one that the public official). According to the whole purport of the arguments, it is acknowledged that both parties are not the organization of the state administration, but the fact that the defendant retains and manages the information on the amount of retirement allowances accumulated in such organization, and there is no evidence to support that the state administration personnel receives and manages the information on the amount of retirement allowances accumulated in such organization, regardless of whether the government administration personnel receives a certain amount of money each month from the state administration personnel or has funds created from the cash benefits paid to the employees each month

Therefore, among the instant lawsuits, the part seeking the revocation of the instant non-disclosure decision regarding the information stated in paragraphs 2, 3, 4, and 5 is unlawful as there is no benefit of lawsuit.

3. Whether the instant disposition is legitimate with respect to the information listed in attached list 1

A. The plaintiff's assertion

The information listed in paragraph (1) of the above list does not constitute information subject to non-disclosure under Article 9(1)1, 3, and 6 of the Information Disclosure Act, and the instant disposition is unlawful.

B. Relevant statutes

It is as shown in the attached Form.

(c) Markets:

Article 9(1) of the Information Disclosure Act provides that any information held and managed by a public institution shall be subject to disclosure, while subparagraph 1 of the proviso provides that any information specified as confidential or confidential by any other Act or any order delegated by any other Act (limited to the National Assembly Regulations, Supreme Court Regulations, National Election Commission Regulations, Presidential Decree, Presidential Decree, and municipal ordinances) may not be disclosed. This is intended to avoid conflicts between laws by respecting the information specified as confidential or confidential by other Acts, etc.

Meanwhile, according to Article 12 of the National Intelligence Service Act, the National Intelligence Service's demand for the expenditure budget as an independent institution as prescribed by the National Finance Act is the total amount of the National Intelligence Service's expenses and information cost. The details of the calculation and the documents attached to the budget bill stipulated in Article 34 of the National Finance Act need not be submitted. The National Assembly Information Committee shall not disclose the budget deliberation of the National Assembly, and members of the National Assembly Information Committee shall not disclose or divulge the budget details of the National Assembly.

Article 150(1) of the Civil Procedure Act provides that the NIS’s payment of remuneration or cash allowances and activity expenses, etc. to its employees separately from the allowances and allowances, shall be deemed to have been led to confession (Article 150(1) of the Civil Procedure Act). However, according to the purport of the entire pleadings, the above activity expenses, etc. are deemed to have been disbursed from the budget items of “project expenses” out of the National Intelligence Service’s expenses and information expenses, which are included in the total budget of the NIS’s budget. The disclosure of the details is in conflict with the legislative intent of Article 12(a) of the NIS’s Act that provides that the budget details shall not be included in the total amount, and the budget details shall not be included in the non-disclosure of the budget contents. The purpose of the formulation of the budget contents is to include the non-disclosure of the budget contents. In particular, since it is difficult to conclude that the budget items of the project expenses that the Plaintiff seeks disclosure should be included in the non-party’s benefits that the Plaintiff actually paid for the performance of his/her duties should not be included in the list of benefits.

Therefore, the information listed in attached list 1 falls under the information subject to non-disclosure under Article 9(1)1 of the Information Disclosure Act, and the plaintiff's above assertion is without merit without further review.

4. Conclusion

Therefore, some of the lawsuits in this case are dismissed as unlawful and the remaining claims are dismissed as it is without merit, and the judgment of the court of first instance is partially unfair, and it is so decided as per Disposition by the decision of the court of first instance.

[Attachment List of Information, Omission of Related Acts]

Judges Park Poe-dae (Presiding Judge) Lee Jae-hoon