New Heavenly cardinal Lee Man-hee was criticized after apologizing to the public for wearing a watch signed by former South Korean president Park Geun-hye.

Lee Man-hee, 88, knelt down and bent his head to the floor to apologize to the Korean people at a press conference this afternoon in Gapyeong District, Gyeonggi Province. He hoped to ease public outrage towards the New Heavenly sect, but made even more people angry about the watch he was wearing.

The golden watch on his left hand is a gift from former President Park Geun-hye, who was deposed and sentenced to prison in 2017 on charges of corruption and abuse of power. Lee's watch image was quickly shared on social networking site Twitter, while the phrase "Lee Man-hee watch" became the most searched keyword on Korea's largest online platform Naver.

"He is bragging about Mrs. Park's gift," one person wrote on Twitter.

"The watch is shiny and clear, like his loyalty and relationship with Park Geun-hye," another account said.

Cardinal Lee has not yet commented on the incident, but the leader of a Tan Thien Dia branch insisted the watch had no problems. "It has nothing to do with politics. He wore it because there were no other watches. It was a commendable reward," the man said, adding that Lee had been a veteran of the Korean War. .

Lee's watch costs about $ 100-420 on the secondhand market, the image of the press conference shows it has the badge and signature of former president Park.

Lee Gun-yong, a former aide to the presidential office and now the leader of the opposing Unified Future Party (UFP), said that the priest of Tan Thien Dia was a fake, only by Park's office. order silver. The UFP representative also affirmed that there was no political connection with the Tan Thien Dia.

The New Heavenly sect became a major outbreak in South Korea after a 61-year-old female devotee, known as "Patient 31", was identified with nCoV and could have spread the virus while attending church at a church. Daegu city.

60% of current Covid-19 cases in South Korea are related to the followers of New Heavenly Yard in Daegu or those related to them. Experts predict the number of infections will rise in the coming days as health officials complete testing of more than 210,000 members of the sect. Mr. Lee took the nCoV test yesterday and got a negative result.

Seoul city authorities are proposing to investigate Lee and the top eleven leaders of Tianjin on charges of murder, accusing the New Territories of contributing to the increase in the number of deaths from Covid-19 due to the failure to provide members list and hinder the administration's anti-epidemic efforts. However, Mr. Lee confirmed that Tan Thien Dia was "actively working with the government".

South Korea is currently the second largest outbreak of Covid-19 in the world after mainland China with more than 4,200 positive cases of nCoV and 22 deaths. Nearly 80 countries have restricted entry for people from South Korea with bans or quarantine tighter due to disease concerns.