South Korea president apologises for abusive foreign adoption scheme
Programme, which started after Korean War as a way of removing mixed-race children from society, violated human rights.
대한민국대통령
RESIDENT OF THE REPUBLICO
After years of delay, South Korea in July rati-fied The Hague Adoption Convention, an in-ternational treaty meant to safeguard in-ternational adoptions. The treaty took effect in South Korea on Wednesday.
Former president Kim Dae-jung apologised during a meeting with overseas adoptees in 1998, saying: "From the bottom of my heart, I am truly sorry. I deeply feel that we have committed a grave wrong against you."
But he stopped short of acknowledging the state's responsibility for the decades of mal-practice.
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"On October 1st this year, South Korea officially became a part of the Hague Convention on the Protection of Children and Cooperation in International Adoption."
South Korea thus joins over 100 countries that have ratified the Convention and promised the international community to prioritize the protection of children's rights and to implement domestic and international adoptions in a transparent and responsible manner.
Until now we are anything but proud of our past. South Korea previously had the disgraceful label of being a "child exporter". Only official statistics say that over 170,000 children have been adopted to other countries since the Korean War. And even in the 2020s, now that South Korea is a developed nation, an average of over 100 children per year have been forced to leave the country for unknown destinations abroad.
While some children have ended up in loving adoptive families, others have suffered throughout their lives because of irresponsibility and the way adoption agencies operate.
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