Pham The Duyet, president of the Vietnam Fatherland Front, also made a similar
request. He told Im that South Korea should pay more attention to the
Vietnamese immigrants so that they can better integrate into Korean society.
There is no doubt that the Vietnamese leadership is concerned about the alleged
abuse of Vietnamese women by their Korean husbands. The Southeast Asian country
has been hit by media reports that Vietnamese wives are the victims of various
kinds of spousal abuse.
A horrible case in Daejeon in July involved a 19-year-old Vietnamese woman who
reportedly died after being violently beaten by her husband. In another case, a
Vietnamese woman entered into a marriage with a Korean man who only wanted her
to give birth to a baby. The man divorced her and took the baby to reunite with
his infertile ex-wife. Some people fear that such incidents could harm
diplomatic relations between Seoul and Hanoi.
The abuse of foreign wives is not confined to women from Vietnam. Many foreign
women getting married to Koreans in search of the ``Korean dream'' confront the
stark reality of domestic violence, verbal abuse and discrimination in Korean
society. Some of them even fall prey to human trafficking. An annual U.S.
report on human trafficking showed that a growing number of foreigners are
trafficked to South Korea for sexual or labor exploitation though brokered
marriages. The report carried a photograph of a roadside billboard advertising
an international marriage broker who promises to offer Vietnamese brides who
would not run away. This indicates how serious the human trafficking issue is
in the country.
Cases related to Vietnamese women have drawn much attention because their
numbers are rapidly growing. The number of Chinese women married to Koreans
last year was estimated at 14,450. But most of them are ethnic Koreans from
China's northeastern provinces. The number of Vietnamese wives stood at 9,812.
Thus, Vietnamese women have actually emerged as the largest foreign wives'
group in South Korea. The number of women from the Philippines and Mongolia
reached 1,131 and 559, respectively.
The Seoul government has worked out policy packages to protect the rights of
foreign spouses and help them adapt to Korean society. However, such steps have
yet to produce any remarkable results. A Seoul National University survey
showed that one out of every 10 foreign spouses has suffered domestic violence,
while three out of every 10 has experienced verbal abuse.
Policymakers should take more fundamental measures to ensure foreign wives' human rights and crack down on domestic violence and other types of spousal abuse. South Koreans will also have to warmly embrace not only foreign brides but also migrant workers as our society increasingly moves toward globalization and multiculturalism.
