Former National Security Advisor Suh Hoon has been released from prison after posting bail.

According to the legal sector, the Seoul Central District Court approved bail for Suh on Monday, releasing him after his imprisonment last December on an indictment for abusing his authority to cover up the 2020 killing of a fisheries official by North Korea near the Yellow Sea border.

As a condition of the bail, the court ordered Suh to pay 150 million won as a deposit while allowing him to pay 100 million won of that money in bail bond insurance.

The court also ordered Suh to ask for permission if he wants to change his residence or travel to another area or leave the country.

Suh was put on trial on December 12 of last year, nine days after he was detained.

He is accused of deciding to conceal the North's killing of a fisheries official named Lee Dae-jun in 2020 and instructing government agencies to delete related intelligence during a ministers' meeting held the day after his death.

Suh has flatly denied the allegations against him, claiming a cover-up was impossible because hundreds of people in the National Intelligence Service and the National Security Office knew about the incident.

In asking the court for him to be released on bail earlier in January, Suh’s lawyers had requested that consideration be made for the fact that their client is in his 70s and is suffering from a cardiovascular disease.