Park Jae-beom

JYP Entertainment, the management agency of boy band 2PM, has officially severed ties with the combo's original leader Park Jae-beom after he took time off over controversial Internet comments last September. But the reason was not the controversy but other unspecified "private issues," the entertainment giant said.

In a statement on its website JYP announced a "mistake" by Park while 2PM were riding a wave of popularity with their single "Again & Again" last summer "belatedly emerged" but declined to go into detail. It added it cancelled Park’s contract.  

In September Park, who grew up in America, infuriated Koreans with comments posted on MySpace while he was still going through the JYP pop star mill saying, "Korea is gay. I hate Koreans. I wanna come back," and, "Korea is whack, but everyone thinks I'm like the illest rapper when I suck nuts at rapping."

Park withdrew from the band and disappeared to Seattle, where he lives with his parents.