Entertainment industry lashes out at Clara

Clara Lee / Korea Times file

The Korea Entertainment Management Association (KEMA) is calling on celebrity Clara to halt her activities in the entertainment industry until she resolves a high-profile legal dispute.

KEMA said in a statement Wednesday that the Swiss-born British actress is “disrupting the nation’s entertainment industry” and warned of penalties should she continue working.

Clara last month filed a suit demanding termination of her contract with Polaris Entertainment claiming the owner of the firm, Lee Kyu-tae, made sexually harassing comments to her.

The agency countersued the 29-year-old actress, claiming she fabricated the claims as a ploy to escape her contract.

“As a star and a center of this scandal, she must ask for public’s permission to continue her career,” the statement said. “She must halt her career now because she hasn’t publicly apologized for raising the scandal.”

KEMA claimed that Clara’s legal action was reminiscent of a suit she filed against her former agency in 2012.

Established in 2007, KEMA consists of 242 companies with some 1,400 actors and 432 registered members.