Lee, Myung-Bak (1941– )

South Korean business leader and right-of-centre politician, president from 2008. After a career in business, in 1992 he moved into politics, being elected to South Korea's National Assembly, and in 2002 he was elected mayor of the capital, Seoul. In 2007 he won the Grand National Party's primary to become its presidential nominee and was elected president in Decmber 2007, with 49% of the vote. He ran on a platform of accelerating economic growth to 7% per annum, in part through a Pan Korea Grand Waterway project (from Buan to Seoul), and a firmer approach to the North, with economic aid to be tied to North Korea abandoning its nuclear weapons programme. He took office as president in February 2008.

Born during World War II in a Korean residential district in Osaka, Japan, where his father was working on a farm, his family returned to Pohang, South Korea, in 1945, at the end of the war. He studied at Korea University but was arrested and imprisoned for three months for participating in demonstrations against President Park Chung-hee's talks with Japan. He became a successful business leader, helping to build the car manufacturer Hyundai into a major force during a 27-year career from 1965, reaching the top as company chairman.