Naver News Article:
”We Are Victims Of The State" - The Tears of Overseas Adoptees Sold Without Their Parents Knowing”

Thank you to Chang Seon Kim for the link.

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Please see related articles:

Two Korean Adoptees, Yooree KIM and Rebecca Kimmel, Respond To The TRCK Press Release About Its First Report On “Human Rights Violations in the Overseas Adoption Process” - 
March 26th, 2025.

TRC Press Release - March 26th, 2025

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Translation via ChatGPT. Bolds and red highlighting ours. Please note that Kim Yu-ri is the same person as Yooree KIM.

Naver Article: "We are victims of the state"… The tears of overseas adoptees sold away without their parents knowing
Input: March 26, 2025, 11:30 AM  Updated: March 26, 2025, 11:31 AM

Reporter: Park Hye-yeon

Truth and Reconciliation Commission announces investigation into human rights violations in the overseas adoption process Identity swapping and inadequate screening of adoptive parents…Adoption donation business

On March 26th, 2025, overseas adoptee Kim Yu-ri (Yooree KIM) knelt before Chairperson Park Sun-young at a press conference held at the Namsan Square Building in Jung-gu, Seoul, appealing for truth and justice regarding human rights violations in the overseas adoption process. March 26, 2025 / News1 ⓒ News1 Heo Kyung 기자

Seoul = News1) Reporter Park Hye-yeon = "I lived for 39 years believing I was a kia (abandoned child)."

Kim Yu-ri, who was adopted to France, spoke in a trembling voice in front of reporters, stating, "We are victims of the state."

Kim explained, "I was temporarily placed in an orphanage at my mother's request, and my mother never signed an adoption consent form," urging, "Please recognize adoptees who were sold abroad without their parents' knowledge as victims of forced disappearance."

After the Korean War, numerous human rights violations were confirmed in the process of children from our country being adopted overseas, including the loss or distortion of original identities and family information, and a lack of proper protective measures after being sent abroad.

The Truth and Reconciliation Commission for the Past (Truth Reconciliation Commission) held a press conference on the morning of the 26th in Jung-gu, Seoul, announcing the investigation results of "human rights violations in the process of overseas adoption."

The Truth and Reconciliation Commission found that various human rights violations occurred over the past 2 years and 7 months of investigation, including: △false reports of discovering abandoned children and other record manipulations, △absence of valid adoption consent, △intentional identity swaps, △inadequate assessments of adoptive parents' qualifications, △mass export of children to meet adoptive parent demand, and △forced collection of adoption donations.

For instance, a person named Kwon, born in 1976 to an unmarried couple, was raised by his uncle and subsequently referred to an adoption agency. He was recorded as having departed on March 15, 1977, in place of another child named Eom.

Eom was discovered as an abandoned child on the streets of Seoul and was registered as an orphan, but tragically passed away for unknown reasons while overseas adoption was being pursued. Since the adoption process was already at the completion stage, the adoption agency, the Korea Social Service Agency, swapped the child's identity and did not inform the adoptive parents of this fact.

In cases where adoption was halted due to a child's death before departure or a relative reclaiming the child, it was common for adoption agencies to manipulate the identity of newly acquired children to match those already in process, allowing for rapid departure. This was done to avoid refunding fees due to adoption cancellations and to bypass administrative procedures related to the acquisition of new children.

In December 1984, dozens of internationally adopted children were seen flying for long hours strapped into airplane seats without proper care. This image was published in the annual report of a Danish adoption agency. (Provided by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission)

The assessment of prospective adoptive parents was also poorly conducted. A former civil servant who worked in the Ministry of Health and Social Affairs and in overseas migration countries in the late 1970s stated, "In reality, it is impossible to thoroughly review thousands of international adoption cases each year."

In fact, a total of 7,964 applications for overseas migration through international adoption were submitted to the Ministry of Health and Social Affairs in 1984. Of these, 6,599 cases (82.9%) were processed on the same day as the application, and 1,279 cases (16.1%) were approved the following day.

At a press conference that day, three adoptees, including Mr. Kim, Ms. Han Bunyun, and Mr. Peter Miller, expressed their concerns about the issues within the international adoption system.

Kim said, "My friend was adopted to France through Holt in 1974, and was raped by her adoptive father from the time she was 5 months old until she was 10 years old," and sobbed, "I earnestly ask you to think again about the dangers of overseas adoption in Korea." The Truth and Reconciliation Commission made the first truth-finding decision on 56 applicants for human rights violations during the overseas adoption process at the 102nd committee meeting held the previous afternoon. However, the decision to postpone the case of 46 applicants was made due to insufficient data.

The human rights violation case in the international adoption process involves 367 adoptees who were sent from Korea to 11 countries between 1964 and 1999. They claimed that their identities were violated due to manipulated documents during the adoption process.

By adoption country, 61.9% (227 individuals) of the applicants were adopted to Denmark, making it the most common destination, followed by the United States (45), Sweden (22), Norway (20), the Netherlands and Belgium (17 each), Australia (10), Germany (5), France (2), and Canada and Luxembourg (1 each).

The Truth and Reconciliation Commission stated, "The maintenance of wrongful international adoption practices for decades reflects the state's failure to fulfill its obligation to guarantee the basic human rights of adoptees." They recommended: a formal apology from the state, an investigation into the citizenship status of adoptees and subsequent measures, remedial actions for victims affected by identity document manipulation, improvements to the adoption information system, substantial support for family reunifications, prompt ratification of the Hague Convention on Intercountry Adoption, and efforts to restore the rights of adoptees by adoption agencies.

Commission Chair Park Sun-young expressed, "This should not just be about unearthing past pain, but a new opportunity for more than 140,000 international adoptees and the countries that adopted them to work together to address the identity confusion they face, while providing various educational and employment opportunities to soothe their suffering."

Reporter: Park Hye-yeon (hypark@news1.kr)