Lawyers for fallen South Korean scientist Hwang Woo-suk yesterday called for additional tests to verify Hwang's insistence that his stem cell breakthroughs were genuine despite being discredited in a scandal over the falsified research behind them.
As Hwang's lawyers opened their defense in his trial over alleged misappropriation of public and private funds for forged research, they said they want a court order to retrieve samples of what Hwang claims to be the world's first cloned embryonic stem cells.
Seoul National University deemed them to be from mutated eggs, not cloned stem cells, after questions were raised about Hwang's breakthroughs at a university laboratory, which he reported in a 2004 article for the journal Science.
The school has refused to return the samples to Hwang after firing him earlier this year, Hwang's lawyer Jung Keun-hwa said.
"We have a plan to conduct more tests," Jung said in court.
Hwang believes that further tests could show that the samples are indeed genuine cloned stem cells, Jung said.
Hwang has maintained that anything that was falsified in his research results was done by researchers at his laboratory who deceived him into thinking the results were real.
In court yesterday, Hwang said that any allegations that he ordered his researchers to fabricate DNA test results were "a story like a novel."
"I didn't even know the means to fabricate DNA tests," Hwang said, claiming "it was very clear" that his researchers had lied to prosecutors.
He said he had never coerced his researchers into following unethical orders and that his researchers "were not the type of people who would have followed inappropriate orders even if they were told to."
Researchers have testified at previous hearings, however, that they couldn't question or disobey Hwang, who was senior to them.
Hwang is facing charges for allegedly accepting 2 billion won (US$2.1 million) in private donations based on the outcome of the falsified research and of embezzling about 800 million won in private and government research funds. If convicted, he faces at least three years in prison.
Hwang's claims of world-leading advances in the new field of stem cell research were discredited after revelations last year of ethics lapses that culminated in Hwang admitting that forged evidence was used for some of his academic papers.
At the last court hearing last month, lawyers for Hwang's associates facing similar charges began their defense.
Hwang's purported breakthroughs published in leading international science journals had thrust South Korea to the fore of stem-cell research, which some scientists believe could help create innovative new cures for untreatable diseases.
Stem cells are basic cells that can grow into all kinds of tissue, and cloning them could create a way for patients to be treated while minimizing risk of rejection.
VAGUE: The criteria of the amnesty remain unclear, but it would cover political violence from 1999 to today, and those convicted of murder or drug trafficking would not qualify Venezuelan Acting President Delcy Rodriguez on Friday announced an amnesty bill that could lead to the release of hundreds of prisoners, including opposition leaders, journalists and human rights activists detained for political reasons. The measure had long been sought by the US-backed opposition. It is the latest concession Rodriguez has made since taking the reins of the country on Jan. 3 after the brazen seizure of then-Venezuelan president Nicolas Maduro. Rodriguez told a gathering of justices, magistrates, ministers, military brass and other government leaders that the ruling party-controlled Venezuelan National Assembly would take up the bill with urgency. Rodriguez also announced the shutdown
Civil society leaders and members of a left-wing coalition yesterday filed impeachment complaints against Philippine Vice President Sara Duterte, restarting a process sidelined by the Supreme Court last year. Both cases accuse Duterte of misusing public funds during her term as education secretary, while one revives allegations that she threatened to assassinate former ally Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. The filings come on the same day that a committee in the House of Representatives was to begin hearings into impeachment complaints against Marcos, accused of corruption tied to a spiraling scandal over bogus flood control projects. Under the constitution, an impeachment by the
Exiled Tibetans began a unique global election yesterday for a government representing a homeland many have never seen, as part of a democratic exercise voters say carries great weight. From red-robed Buddhist monks in the snowy Himalayas, to political exiles in megacities across South Asia, to refugees in Australia, Europe and North America, voting takes place in 27 countries — but not China. “Elections ... show that the struggle for Tibet’s freedom and independence continues from generation to generation,” said candidate Gyaltsen Chokye, 33, who is based in the Indian hill-town of Dharamsala, headquarters of the government-in-exile, the Central Tibetan Administration (CTA). It
A Virginia man having an affair with the family’s Brazilian au pair on Monday was found guilty of murdering his wife and another man that prosecutors say was lured to the house as a fall guy. Brendan Banfield, a former Internal Revenue Service law enforcement officer, told police he came across Joseph Ryan attacking his wife, Christine Banfield, with a knife on the morning of Feb. 24, 2023. He shot Ryan and then Juliana Magalhaes, the au pair, shot him, too, but officials argued in court that the story was too good to be true, telling jurors that Brendan Banfield set
RSS