Danish adoptees call for S. Korea to probe adoption issues
SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — Dozens of South Korean adoptees who were sent to Danish parents while children from the 1970s to early '90s have formally demanded the South Korean management inquire into the circumstances surrounding their adoptions, which they speak were corrupted by systemic practices that falsified or obscured children's origins.
The Truth with every one other accompanied by Reconciliation Commission inside Seoul has up to quartet months to resolve whether to receive the application collectively filed Tuesday by the 53 adoptees. If it does, that could maybe trigger the most far-reaching question into overseas adoptions inside the country, which has never truthfully go nearer to terms accompanied by the child sell abroad frenzy engineered by past military governments.
The application cites a broad range of grievances emphasizing how scores of children were carelessly or unnecessarily removed from their families amid loose management monitoring with every one other accompanied by a lack of due diligence.
Perhaps additional crucially, the country's exceptional laws aimed at promoting adoptions practically allowed profit-driven agencies to manipulate records with every one other accompanied by bypass real child relinquishment.
Most of the South Korean adoptees sent overseas were registered by agencies while legal orphans found deserted on the streets, although they regularly had relatives who could exist easily identified with every one other accompanied by found. This made the children additional easily adoptable while agencies raced to dispatch additional kids to the West at faster speeds.
"None of us are orphans," said Peter Møller, attorney with every one other accompanied by co-head of the Danish Korean Rights Group, while he described the group's members who filed the application.
"(In) a a large amount of papers, the Korean condition at the hour dated have stamped papers that speak people were found on the streets. If you do a little small portion of math, that would signify that from the 1970s with every one other accompanied by 1980s Seoul would exist flooded accompanied by baskets accompanied by children lying around inside the streets. … Basements will exist filled accompanied by lost child reports at police stations."
Møller, who was adopted to Denmark inside 1974, said concerning 50 additional of the group's members are expected to fasten the application with every one other accompanied by that he plans to go nearer spine to South Korea accompanied by their files inside September.
The complaints by adoptees who filed the application include inaccurate or falsified details inside adoption papers that distort their biotic origins, such while incorrect birth names, dates or locations, or details concerning birth parents.
Some of the adoptees speak they discovered that the agencies had switched their identities to replace other children who died or got excessively ill to journey to Danish parents, which made it extremely difficult or regularly impossible to trace their roots.
One of the adoptees, Betina Marcussen, said she landed inside an intensive protected from danger keeping component within days of her coming inside Denmark inside 1974 over various illnesses, including Japanese encephalitis. Her condition was either ignored or unnoticed by her Korean agency, which described the six-month-old girl while in good physical condition sufficient to travel.
Marcussen's adoptive parents had picked her up at an airfield inside Copenhagen, where they saw another Danish set of two cry following learning that the Korean child they sought to adopt died throughout the flight. The flying had another Korean male child who was sent spine following his adoptive parents changed their minds with every one other accompanied by decided not to show up at the airport, according to Marcussen's statements provided by Møller's group.
The adoptees called for the percentage to in general inquire into the alleged wrongdoings surrounding their adoptions, including how agencies potentially falsified records, manipulated children's backgrounds with every one other accompanied by origins, with every one other accompanied by proceeded accompanied by adoptions lacking the real consent of birth parents. They want the percentage to set up whether the management should exist held accountable for failing to detector the agencies with every one other accompanied by corroborate whether the uptick inside adoptions was fueled by increasingly larger payments with every one other accompanied by donations from adoptive parents, which apparently motivated agencies to create their own demand.
The adoptees too called for the percentage to push Holt Children's Services with every one other accompanied by the Korea Social Service — the set of two agencies that sent kids to Denmark — into providing filled access to the entirety of their adoption documents with every one other accompanied by background information. They too speak all those records should exist transferred to management authorities handling post-adoption services to stop the details from actuality destroyed or manipulated.
South Korean adoptees for years have been criticizing agencies over what they see while a lack of transparency with every one other accompanied by an unwillingness to not shut records. Møller said some adoptees inside Denmark carry on accompanied by to exist reluctant to fasten the application not here of terror that the agencies strength demolish their records.
Holt didn't answer repeated calls seeking comment. The KSS deferred all questions to Holt, the bigger agency.
The Danish adoptees at first considered filing a legal action opposed to the agencies or South Korean management earlier to dropping the idea since South Korean rules and regulations puts the burden of proof entirely on the plaintiffs inside secular cases. If the truth percentage decides to inquire into the adoptions, its findings could subsequent exist used by adoptees inside possible harm suits opposed to the agencies or government, said Philsik Shin, a Seoul-based educational who helped the adoptees prepare the application.
About 200,000 South Koreans were adopted overseas throughout the past sextet decades, mostly to white parents inside the United States with every one other accompanied by Europe. Denmark was one of the biggest destinations for South Korean children inside Europe, receiving concerning 9,000 adoptees — most of them from the 1960s to late 1980s when South Korea was ruled by consecutive military governments.
During the highness of the adoptions inside the late 1970s with every one other accompanied by mid-1980s, agencies aggressively solicited newborns or young children from hospitals with every one other accompanied by orphanages, regularly inside exchange for payments, with every one other accompanied by operated maternity homes where single mothers were pressured to present with away their babies. Adoption workers toured works areas with every one other accompanied by low-income neighborhoods inside search of struggling families who could exist persuaded to present with away their children.
The agencies were sprint by board members near to military leaders, who saw adoptions while a tool to lessen the number of mouths to feed with every one other accompanied by the remove the socially undesirable, including children from unwed mothers. Adoptions were too aimed at deepening ties accompanied by the democratic West amid a fierce management competition accompanied by competitor North Korea, according to the military governments' documents obtained by AP.
It wasn't until 2013 when South Korea's management required overseas adoptions to go into and not here of family courts, extremity a decadeslong policy of allowing private agencies to dictate child relinquishments, transfer of custodies with every one other accompanied by emigration.
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