A South Korean truth commission says it found evidence that women were pressured into giving away their infants for foreign adoptions at government-funded facilities where thousands of so-called “vagrants” were confined and enslaved from the 1960s to the 1980s.
Lee Sang Hoon, a standing commissioner, speaks to the media during a news conference at the Truth and Reconciliation Commission in Seoul , South Korea , Monday, Sept. 9, 2024. Ha Kum Chul, one of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission’s investigators, speaks to the media during a news conference at the commission in Seoul , South Korea , Monday, Sept. 9, 2024.
While the facilities’ records say some of the women submitted memos expressing their consent to give away their children, other records indicate women were being pressured to do so, Ha said. A 1985 inmate record from Huimangwon flags a 42-year-old inmate with supposed mental health issues for “causing problems” by refusing to relinquish her child. Officials later note that she eventually did.
The commission also identified other human rights problems at the four facilities it highlighted on Monday, which also included Gaengsaengwon in Seoul and Seonghyewon in Gyeonggi province. The facilities’ death tolls were high — the 262 inmates who were reported as dead from Gaengsaengwon in 1980 accounted for more than 25% of the facility’s population that year, Ha said.
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