Assassination of Park Chung Hee

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On 26 October 1979, Park Chung Hee, the third president of South Korea, was assassinated during a dinner at the Korean Central Intelligence Agency (KCIA) safe house near the Blue House presidential compound in Jongno District, Seoul, South Korea. It was the first assassination of a head of state on the Korean peninsula in 605 years since the assassination of King Gongmin of Goryeo. Kim Jae-gyu, the then director of the KCIA, was responsible for the assassination. Park was shot in the chest and the head. The head of the presidential security service, three bodyguards and a presidential chauffeur were also killed by Kim and his co-conspirators. The incident is often referred to as "10.26" or the "10.26 incident" in South Korea. There is a great deal of controversy surrounding Kim's motives; it remains uncertain whether the act was part of a planned coup d'état or was merely impulsive. Discontent with Park's regime had been simmering below the surface and had culminated with the Busan–Masan...

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