South Korean Police Finds Seoul Mayor's Body

Police in South Korean capital Seoul said that they found Mayor Park Won-soon's body near the location where he had last used his cell phone.

The story began when his daughter had reported him missing when a frantic night-time search, lasted for seven hours, had been launched.

His daughter reported that her father had left a "will-like" message and left the house without returning.

Park left the mayor's residence at about 10:40 a.m. Korea local time (0140 GMT), wearing a black hat and a backpack. Local reports indicated that he canceled a policy meeting scheduled for Thursday morning.

An official from the Seoul Metropolitan Government, Kim Ji-hyeong, told AP that Park did not show up for work on Thursday.

According to official statement, the police said that in the early hours of Friday local time, they had located Park Won-soon's body in Sungbuk-dong, a district in northern Seoul, the last location his cell phone had registered before being turned off. Park’s body was found in the hills, near a traditional restaurant and banquet hall.

Police gave no information on a possible cause of death, but did say that they had found no initial indications of foul play.

Mean while, domestic media and the AFP news agency reported that a former Seoul City employee had filed a sexual harassment complaint against Park with police on Wednesday evening. Local media claimed that a television channel was planning to broadcast news of the previously unreported case on Thursday evening.

Park was elected mayor of the sprawling capital city in 2011 and in June 2019, he was voted into his third and final term. Park Won-soon was a member of President Moon Jae-in's liberal Democratic Party and had been touted for a run at becoming South Korea's president in the country's next nationwide elections in 2022.

According to media reports, the 64-year-old was a longtime civic activist and human rights lawyer, known for criticizing South Korea's growing social and economic inequalities. He defended political activists in the 1980s and 1990s before launching the People's Solidarity for Participatory Democracy. The NGO helped to reform conglomerates that dominated South Korean businesses and became one of the largest non-profits in South Korea.

He played a major role in the Candlelight Demonstrations that led to the 2017 impeachment and 2018 conviction of former President Park Geun-hye.