Regulators worldwide have been seeking the arrest of Terra founder Do Kwon. Several cases have been filed against the executive allegedly blaming him for the wipeout of LUNA and UST—two cryptos belonging to the Terra ecosystem.
Towards the end of September, the International Criminal Police Organization [Interpol] issued a Red Notice against Terra founder Do Kwon to foster his arrest. Commenting on the same in his latest interview with Laura Shin on the UnChained podcast, he said,
“We have currently made a request to check on the status on the red notice, but as far as I understand it is not an international arrest warrant.”
Despite having charges against him, the Terra executive has been blamed for being on the run and not returning back to Korea. Clarifying the same, Kwon stressed the fact that he had “not been living in South Korea” since the end of last year and said that it’s inaccurate that he’s “not returning” back to the nation. He added,
“The more accurate point would be to say ‘would I travel to South Korea?“
Kwon further expressed his disappointment with the prosecutors and said,
“We are a little bit disappointed in the way that prosecutors are attempting to create new regulation through criminal court proceedings, whereas that should be within the job description of the legislature, or at the very least the financial regulators.”
On capital market violations and other allegations
Korean officials have allegedly accused Kwon and five others of crimes including breaches of capital-markets law. Recently, the prosecutors confirmed that there was “circumstantial evidence of escape” ever since Kwon left for Singapore, and that is why an arrest warrant was issued in the first place.
In the podcast, Kwon said that none of the capital charges are applicable. According to him, per the government, cryptos are not securities and do not fall under the Capital Markets Act. He further added,
“We don’t believe these are legitimate charges and are politically motivated.”
Also, it is worth recalling that LFG was allegedly blamed for selling around $65 million worth of Bitcoin by sending it to KuCoin and OKX. The executive said, the funds being moved into exchanges did not imply that they were sold. With respect to the Gemini-related allegations, he added,
“There’s been allegations that we moved LFG funds into a Gemini custody wallet and then it’s sitting there or something like that. All we did was to confirm a trade with a market maker and transfer the Bitcoin to an address at the market maker’s instruction.”