The age of conflict and hostility is over. In the New Millennium, the age of cooperation and coexistence, the need for internatiollal cooperation in preventing corruption is Increasing.

The corruption issue is not restricted to any specific organization or country but has become a global one which confronts all human beings. To implement public administration as transparently as possible, 1 designated the prevention of corruption as one of the main administrative priorities upon taking office, and have taken comprehensive and systematic anti-corruption initiatives to achieve this.

One such initiative taken by the City of Seoul is Online Procedures ENhancement for civil applications, or OPEN It allows our citizens to monitor corruption-prone application procedures via the Internet. Under OPEN, citizens can track the application they have filed at any time.

Benjamin Franklin stressed the significance of transparency in eradicating corruption by saying that "sunlight is the best of disinfectants." For the entire four years of my term I will continue to wage an all-out war against corruption and publicize the whole administrative process from civil applications to policy-making.

I would appreciate your lasting interest and support for Seoul's anti-corruption efforts.

Thank you.