Chung Il-kwon (21 November 1917 – 17 January 1994) was Prime Minister of South Korea from 10 May 1964 to 20 December 1970, succeeding Choi Tu-son and preceding Baek Du-jin.
Biography[]
Chung Il-kwon was born in Ussuriysk, Primorsky Krai, Russian Empire in 1917, the son of a Korean interpreter for the Imperial Russian Army. After the 1917 Russian Revolution, the family moved to North Hamgyong Province in Japanese Korea, and he grew up in Manchuria. He served in the Manchukuo police during World War II under the name "Nakajima Ikken", and, in 1946, he graduated first in his class from the Korea Military Academy. He was promoted to Major-General in the ROKA of South Korea at the start of the Korean War in 1950, and he organized the ROKA soldiers at Inchon and was given command of a division in June 1952. Months later, he was given command of II Corps, leading it until the end of the war. He retired in 1957 and served as ambassador to Turkey, France, and the United States before serving as Foreign Minister from 1963 to 1964 and Prime Minister from 1964 to 1970. From 1973 to 1979, he chaired the National Assembly as a member of the Democratic Republican Party of South Korea. He died in Hawaii in 1994 at the age of 76.