Terraform Labs co-founder Do Kwon has publicly denied any wrongdoing following allegations that he and his business partner Chang-joon Han utilized forged passports. During a statement at the Montenegrin Basic Court, Kwon expressed his unawareness of the alleged forgery involving the Costa Rican passport he possessed, as reported by South Korean news outlet Segye Ilbo.
According to Kwon, he completed all necessary documentation and received the Costa Rican passport from an agency in Singapore, recommended by a friend. He maintained that he had traveled internationally with this passport, and also holds a Belgian passport, which he obtained through another agency.
Both Kwon and Terraform Labs’ former CFO Han were arrested in Montenegro’s Podgorica airport in March while attempting to travel to Dubai with potentially forged documents. This incident followed the 2022 collapse of the Terra ecosystem, which is partly responsible for the crypto industry’s plunge into an extended crypto winter.
With the collapse of Terra’s algorithmic stablecoin UST and its sister coin LUNA, the prices of Bitcoin and other major cryptocurrencies suffered severely. Prominent crypto companies like Three Arrows Capital (3AC), Voyager Digital, and Celsius Network also filed for bankruptcy.
As for the specific agency used for obtaining passports, Kwon reportedly claimed he couldn’t recall the exact details, only recalling that the agency’s name was in Chinese. In court, Kwon insisted on the innocence of his aide Han and requested to be the sole individual punished for the fake passport if necessary.
However, the prosecution has requested that both Kwon and Han be punished, arguing that if the passport was not issued by a legitimate institution, it was created with bad intentions. A court verdict is anticipated on Monday, June 19.
In addition to refuting the forgery allegations connected to his travel documents, Kwon also challenged claims suggesting he financially contributed to Milojko Spajić, the former finance minister of Montenegro and current leader of the Europe Now party. According to a Radio Free Europe report, the South Korean entrepreneur “decisively denied” having any financial ties with Spajić or any involvement in the financing of his political campaign.
Source: Decrypt
