South Korea reforms refugee and asylum law

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Source: Fahamu Refugee Legal Aid

This news was submitted by HoTaeg Lee, head of Refugee pNan in Korea.

I just want to inform you all that the new Refugee Act, apart from Immigration Control Act, finally passed the National Assembly in Korea on 29 December 2011.

Asia Pacific Refugee Rights Network president PhilKyu Hwang, along with attorney JongChul Kim, WonGuen Choi of Nancen, HoTaeg Lee of the Refuge pNan, National Human Rights Commission and UNHCR provided excellent leadership and devotion in making this new law. Lawmaker Woo Yer Hwang played the key role in passing the Act.

The main victory of our legislative activities is that during all refugee application processes, including judicial procedures, refugee applicants will now have legal status to stay in Korea and will be protected by a work permit, subsistence allowances, housing, medical care, and education.

The Act also stipulates detailed RSD procedures, including the procedure at ports of entry, an information guide, interpretation, legal assistance, NGO presences, video and audio recording, confirmation and copy of the interview records, confidentiality, detention for identification, and an appeals committee, amongst other details.

Under the Act, a first instance decision should be made within six months of the application, but if necessary it can be extended for six months with seven days prior notice. The appeal process is  the same. Applications submitted with false and fraudulent documents, re-applications submitted without a basic situation change or applications submitted in in order to avoid or delay imminent removal after a stay in Korea of more than one year can be handled by simplified or accelerated process.

The Act also adds clauses for recognized refugees beyond the protection of the refugee convention, related to family unity and recognition of academic diplomas and qualification licence.

The new Refugee Act will come into effect on 1 July 2013 for cases filed thereafter.

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• Resource: UNHCR guidance note: LGBTI refugees in forced displacement (madikazemi.blogspot.com)

Gay South Korean wins Canadian asylum

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Source: Yonhap News Agency

Canada awarded a South Korean man refugee status after he objected to the mandatory military service in his home country for being a pacifist and a homosexual, a local human rights group said 15 December.

The Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada (IRB) granted the status in July 2009 to Kim Kyung-hwan, 31, saying the gay conscript is highly likely to face abuse and mistreatment back home, according to the Center for Military Human Rights in Korea, which brought the story to light two years after the fact.

In South Korea, all able-bodied South Korean young men are required by law to serve nearly two-year compulsory military service.

There have been many "conscientious objectors to military service" who chose to serve prison terms instead of entering the military against their political and religious beliefs. But Kim's case marks the first time in the country that a man seeks shelter in a foreign country after rejecting military conscription due to his homosexuality, according to the rights group.

"Circumstances facing general South Korean conscripts, especially homosexual ones, are very worrisome," the group quoted IRB as saying. "The applicant should serve in the military, if sent back to his own country, and he is highly likely to face abuses there."

Delivering the approval, IRB quoted some research results that said Korea conscripts frequently fall victim to cruel treatment and harsh punishment, according to the human rights group. About 30-40 percent of draftees suffer physical punishment and nearly 60 percent of conscript deaths are suicides, it also noted.

"If a homosexual is expelled due to his sexual identity, he probably cannot enter into the public sphere such as employment or schools," it said.

Faced with a call to join the military, Kim, a student of a prestigious private university in South Korea, applied for the refugee status in Canada in 2006.

After receiving permanent resident status in the country, Kim has settled down there and is now juggling an academic course and a job, the human rights group said.

"Since I was little, I couldn't sympathize with the military and war at all," Kim said. "I have no regrets (about leaving South Korea) as I had great worries about possible human rights abuses I could have suffered as a homosexual."

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• "South Korea [is] a hard place to be gay" Pt.1 (paulscollections.wordpress.com)

HIV Positive? South Korea Will Happily Deport You!

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Source: change.org

By Corrie Hulse

While the international community focuses on the ongoing tension between the two Koreas, for many on this small peninsula, border tensions are the least of their worries - what truly concerns them is their next required health check and the HIV test that comes with it.

What happens to someone who tests positive? Does such a result lead to counseling and medication? Nope, it leads to immediate deportation to your native country.

Suffice it to say, South Korea is not the place to test positive.

Read more »

South Korean Court Rules for Gay Pakistani Man in Refugee Status

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Source: The Korea Times

A Pakistani man who fled his country for fear of being persecuted because of his sexual orientation should be granted refugee status here, Yonhap News reported Sunday.

A Seoul court said Sunday that it has ruled in favor of the Pakistani complainant, who is gay, and sought to overturn an earlier government decision not to recognize his refugee status here.

The individual had petitioned the government for refugee status in February of last year. The Justice Ministry rejected his application four months later, however, saying his petition did not meet the criteria of a "well-founded fear of being persecuted" as stipulated by the U.N. convention on refugees.

The Seoul Administrative Court reversed the ministry's decision, saying that should he be repatriated "there is a high likelihood that the plaintiff will be subject to persecution by the Pakistani government and Muslim society simply because he is gay."

"My life, as a homosexual, was in danger in my country," the plaintiff told Yonhap News Agency on condition of anonymity due to sensitivity of the issue. "My family and relatives were my enemy. They said I was insulting my family, Islam and my country and threatened that they would report me to police," he said.

South Korea signed onto the U.N. Convention and Protocol relating to the Status of Refugees in 1992. Since then, 2,413 foreigners have applied for refugee status and 145 were granted asylum. The first approval was in 2001 for an Ethiopian male.