1. Moon Jae-in excelled in school and studied law at Kyung Hee University.
76 Facts About Moon Jae-in
1. 2.
Moon Jae-in became a lawyer and was involved in human rights activism with Roh Moo-hyun.
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Moon Jae-in was imprisoned for organizing a protest against the Yushin Constitution.
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Moon Jae-in served in Roh's administration in various official capacities.
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In 2012, Moon Jae-in was a candidate for the Democratic United Party in the 2012 presidential election, which he lost to Park Geun-hye, in which Park was aided by the National Intelligence Service.
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Moon Jae-in's party won a historic victory in the 2020 South Korean legislative election.
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Moon Jae-in left office in May 2022, succeeded by his former prosecutor general, Yoon Suk Yeol.
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Moon Jae-in was born in Geoje, South Korea, on January 24,1953, shortly before the end of the Korean War, as the second child and oldest son among five children of father Moon Yong-hyung and mother Kang Han-ok.
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Moon Jae-in's parents were refugees from South Hamgyong Province, North Korea who fled their native city of Hungnam in the Hungnam evacuation during the Korean War.
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Moon Jae-in's father worked as head of the agriculture department that detained food, especially the rice of Korean colonial people, as one of the main tasks in Heungnam, Hamju, South Hamgyong Province.
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Moon Jae-in's mother became the main earner by selling clothes received from relief organizations and delivering briquettes.
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Moon Jae-in's family became attached to the Catholic Church when his mother went to the local cathedral to receive whole milk powder.
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Moon Jae-in once said in an interview that he did not know how to ride a bike since his family was too poor to afford a bike or a monthly school tuition.
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Moon Jae-in entered Kyungnam High School and reportedly placed at the top of his class.
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Moon Jae-in was accepted to study law at Kyung Hee University with a full scholarship.
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Moon Jae-in stayed at the Buddhist temple of Daeheungsa to study for the exam and passed the first of two rounds in 1979.
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Moon Jae-in graduated from the Institute ranked second in his class but was not appointed a judge or prosecutor due to his history of student activism against the Yushin dictatorship under Park Chung Hee.
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Moon Jae-in was a founding member of the progressive South Korean newspaper, The Hankyoreh, in 1988.
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Moon Jae-in held roles as Senior Presidential Secretary for Civil Affairs, Senior Presidential Secretary for Civil Society and Chief Presidential Secretary from 2003 to 2008.
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Moon Jae-in published a memoir called Moon Jae-in: The Destiny which became a bestseller.
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Moon Jae-in's popularity had been rising steadily against his likely opponent in the presidential race, Park Geun-hye.
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Moon Jae-in managed to capitalize on the conservatives' decline in popularity amid a series of corruption scandals.
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In 2012, Moon Jae-in entered a bid for a seat in the National Assembly in the 19th legislative election.
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On September 16,2012, Moon Jae-in received the presidential nomination for the Democratic United Party.
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Moon Jae-in ran for the 2012 presidential election as the Democratic United Party's candidate in a three-way race against Park Geun-hye, the incumbent ruling party's candidate and daughter of the late president Park Chung Hee, as well as independent software mogul Ahn Cheol-soo.
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Moon Jae-in was elected as the leader of New Politics Alliance for Democracy on February 2,2015.
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Moon Jae-in was considered the frontrunner to win Korea's 2017 presidential election, which would be the 19th term of the country's presidency, following the impeachment and removal of Park Geun-hye.
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Moon Jae-in faced four other major party nominees during the election, including 2012 presidential rival and past party colleague Ahn Cheol-soo of the People's Party and Hong Jun-pyo of the Liberty Korea Party.
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Moon Jae-in was elected the 19th president of South Korea in Korea's 19th presidential election by a large plurality over two.
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Moon Jae-in's announced goal is to create 810,000 public sector jobs through raising taxes on the wealthy.
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Moon Jae-in promised transparency in his presidency, moving the presidential residence from the palatial and isolated Blue House to an existing government complex in downtown Seoul.
32.
Moon Jae-in was criticized for homophobic comments he made in a televised presidential debate for the 2017 presidential election, where Moon Jae-in said he opposed homosexuality, in response to conservative candidate Hong Jun-pyo's remarks that gay soldiers were a source of weakness in the South Korean military.
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Moon Jae-in's remark prompted immediate criticism during the debate from Sim Sang-jung, the sole presidential candidate to support LGBT rights and a member of the left wing Justice Party.
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The discriminatory remark prompted outrage from gay rights activists, with some finding it especially unacceptable considering Moon Jae-in being the leading liberal candidate and a former human rights lawyer.
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Some of Moon Jae-in's supporters dismissed the comments as a tact to win, as South Koreans tend to be conservative on social issues.
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Moon Jae-in has favored a peaceful reunification between the two Koreas.
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Moon Jae-in was both widely criticized and widely praised for his comments stating that his first visit if elected president would be to visit North Korea, a visit that would be not unlike Roh Moo-hyun's visit to the country in 2007.
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Moon Jae-in served out the typical single five-year term with his presidential term concluding in 2022.
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Moon Jae-in subsequently appointed "chaebol sniper" Kim Sang-jo, a well-known shareholder activist, to the role of fair-trade commissioner aimed at reforming chaebols.
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Moon Jae-in reversed those plans in May 2017 in one of his first major acts as president.
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Moon Jae-in adopted Tory, a four-year-old black mongrel saved from a dog meat farm, from an animal rights group.
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Moon Jae-in's administration focused on increasing South Korea's consumption of natural gas, away from nuclear and coal as sources of energy.
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However, in December 2020, in a special report by the National Human Rights Commission of Korea, Moon Jae-in emphasized the necessity of enacting the Equality Act in the country.
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Moon Jae-in visited the United States to meet with US President Donald Trump in June 2017, discussing US-Korea trade relations as well as North Korea's missile programs.
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Moon Jae-in revealed in a joint news conference that President Trump accepted an invitation to visit South Korea.
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Moon Jae-in emphasized alliance with the United States and specified the need to assure dismantlement of North Korea's nuclear weapons program.
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Moon Jae-in supported sanctions against North Korea, while leaving open the possibility of their being rescinded, and indicated that it is crucial to establish a peace treaty with North Korea to end the Korean War officially in exchange for denuclearization.
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Moon Jae-in opposed the full deployment of THAAD systems during his presidential campaign and called for more peace talks engaging with North Korea.
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Moon Jae-in met with Kim Jong Un, Chairman of the Workers' Party of Korea, on April 27,2018.
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In September 2018, Moon Jae-in visited Pyongyang in the September 2018 inter-Korean summit.
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Moon Jae-in climbed Mount Paektu with Kim, which had been a "long unfulfilled dream" for him.
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Moon Jae-in was called "Kim Jong Un's Top Spokesman" by Bloomberg News.
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In October 2018, Moon Jae-in visited Europe and lobbied for reconciliation with North Korea during the tour.
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In January 2020, Moon Jae-in was still serious about inter-Korean cooperation.
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In November 2018, the Financial Times reported that President Moon Jae-In replaced Kim Dong-yeon, finance minister, by Hong Nam-ki, an economic policy official currently serving in the prime minister's office, and Jang Ha-sung, presidential chief of staff for policy.
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Moon Jae-in left office on 9 May 2022 and was succeeded the next day by Yoon Suk Yeol, who previously was appointed by Moon Jae-in to be Prosecutor General of South Korea.
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Moon Jae-in was the final president to occupy the Blue House as the official presidential office and residence after 74 years, as Yoon moved the presidential office to the former Ministry of Defence building at Yongsan District, Seoul upon taking office.
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In May 2024, Moon Jae-in published a memoir entitled From the Periphery to the Center.
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Moon Jae-in initially planned to travel to Seoul to protest the martial law, before the National Assembly overturned the martial law order.
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Moon Jae-in left office as the most popular president in the history of the 6th Republic since free and fair elections resumed in 1987.
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Moon Jae-in's government reduced the maximum hour work week from 68 hours to 52, which led to an increase in work-life balance, increased the minimum wage, expanded childcare benefits and provision, and health care coverage.
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However, Moon Jae-in's government did not act on a new anti-discrimination bill despite having a majority in the National Assembly.
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For foreign policy, Moon Jae-in would be remembered for presiding over South Korea's increased stature and prestige in international affairs as a middle power, and pushing forward with trade negotiations with South East Asia and India under his signature New Southern Policy.
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In 2017, Moon Jae-in apologized to Vietnam for war crimes committed by South Korean troops during the Vietnam War, although the issue was minimized by the Vietnamese media and South Korean media as it wasn't seen as an official apology.
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In September 2015, Moon Jae-in sued former prosecutor Koh Young-ju for libel in response to a statement he had made during Moon Jae-in's campaign in 2013.
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The prosecutor representing Moon Jae-in is seeking one and a half years of jail time for Koh.
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The main perpetrator, as well as the leader of the pro-Moon Jae-in group, was a well-known power-blogger called "Druking".
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Moon Jae-in contended that the Moon administration was working to silence human rights activists in an effort to placate North Korea.
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Moon Jae-in married Kim Jung-sook, a vocalist at Kyung Hee University where he was a student.
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Moon Jae-in and Kim both individually revealed in separate Korean talk shows that they met each other when Moon was a student activist protesting the Yushin Constitution.
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Moon Jae-in has two children: a daughter and a son, Moon Joon Yong who is active as a media artist.
72.
In regards to Tory's adoption, Moon Jae-in stated that "we need to pay more attention to abandoned animals and care for them as a society" and that he wanted to remove the stigma against Tory's dark coat, which contributed to him being virtually un-adoptable for two years after he was rescued in 2015.
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Moon Jae-in received a pair of Pungsan dogs, male Song-gang and female Gom-ee from North Korean counterpart Kim Jong Un as a gift shortly after meeting in September 2018.
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Moon Jae-in is the third Korean president who is a Catholic, after Kim Dae-jung and Roh Moo-hyun.
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Moon Jae-in is the second leader who remains a practicing Catholic while in office; his baptismal name is Timothy.
76.
Moon Jae-in's nickname is the "Dark King", after the character Silvers Rayleigh from the Japanese manga series One Piece.