I must confess, I’m having difficulty understanding this one:
Long-term foreign residents may have to have their fingerprints taken under a government plan to monitor them but this could trigger criticism from human rights organizations.
The Ministry of Justice Wednesday confirmed that it has been “studying” ways of resuming fingerprinting requirements for foreigners since the practice was suspended in 2003.
Human rights groups immediately criticized the move, which they say portrays foreign residents as “potential criminals.”
“We are considering resuming fingerprinting of long-stay foreign nationals,” Kim Young-geun, a ministry official, told The Korea Times. “This is one of the measures under review to reduce crimes committed by non-Koreans,” he said, but added that it could take time to resume the system.
“We have received numerous complaints that the current fingerprinting-free immigration system has loopholes in tracing potential criminal suspects,” Kim said.
I have no problem with the idea of fingerprinting foreigners entering the country. What I don’t get, though, is why fingerprint only long-term residents? Sure, I guess that might help in catching foreign criminals legally residing in Korea, but I doubt many of the 9,000 illegal aliens undocumented Koreans the government says it it will deport this year went to their local immigration office to get alien registration cards, which is when the fingerprinting used to take place and, presumably, where it will take place again if it’s resumed. And when I read press reports bitching about “foreigner crime,” they’re usually bitching about crimes committed by illegal aliens undocumented Koreans. So why fingerprint only the legal aliens?
Seems to me if you’re going to do something like this, you’ve got to fingerprint every foreigner walking through the door ala the United States and Japan. That way, you’ve got the prints of both legal and illegal aliens (or at least most of them).
How is this for misleading, though:
Kim refused to answer when the system will be reintroduced and who will be subject to mandatory fingerprinting. Government data showed that the number of crimes perpetrated by foreigners and overstaying non-Koreans has risen noticeably since the system was abolished.
The National Police Agency reported that the number of crimes involving foreigners hovered around 9,000 in 2004 but the figure jumped to 14,524 last year.
I don’t have the stats for 2004, but in 2005, there were 747,467 foreigners in Korea. In 2007, there were just over 1 million. I’m not a sociologist or a demographer, but I’m thinking this may be more of a contributing factor to the increase in the number of foreign criminals.
UPDATE: To make this clear, the main reason the authorities want to resume fingerprinting is, well, they’re apparently having trouble keeping track of who’s who. In particular, even after they’ve been deported, illegal aliens undocumented Koreans and criminals keep coming back on forged documents with fake IDs. Moreover, unless suspects cooperate, police currently have no means to confirm the identity of foreign suspects. Usually, this is not a problem with Koreans, since all Koreans have their fingerprints taken when they receive their Citizen ID Cards.
The Maeil Gyeongje has a bit more on this.
Like I said, I have no problem with the fingerprinting. I just think it’s stupid to fingerprint only long-term residents. As far as I know, most illegal aliens undocumented Koreans don’t register as long-term residents, and according to a 2006 Korea Institute of Criminology report (citied in the Maeil Gyeongje piece above), some 16% of foreign crime is committed by individuals who enter the country with the intention of committing criminal activity, and I seriously doubt they’re staying long-term, let alone registering their residence status with the proper authorities. If you’re going to fingerprint — and I think it’s a good idea — fingerprint every Tom, Wang and Ahmed as soon as they land at the airport, regardless of length of stay.
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Wasn’t it a couple of years ago there was so much ink spilt, voices lost, hair pulled out, pinkies cut off, dung thrown, candles melted, pants dropped and flags burned (might be confusing a few things here) about the Japanese fingerprinting Korean residents of Japan? Clearly, they don’t like it when they get the finger printed.
So if a suspect is pulled in, and no fingerprint record exists, they’re automatically seen as illegal… What’s the issue?
Is it possible Korea Inc. feels some long-term foreign residents have over-stayed their guest status? How do you get over-stayers to leave? Finger printing, harassment, and murder might encourage foreigners to go home. I hope it never comes to that. Don’t you?
I’m sorry to say this but this is a dumb thing to say. Having someone’s fingerprint on record might help solve a crime but such prevents nothing and adds to the taxpayer’s burden to maintain such a database.
Perhaps the ministry of Justice should concern themselves more with the steadily rising influence of organized crime in Korea (most of which has foreign ties — as they well know) and how to track the flow of money and materiel used to enable these organizations.
Darn, sorry for the hiccup Robert. Could you delete #4 please?
The issue is, from the complaints by cops I’ve read, is that illegals keep reentering the country on forged papers, and this makes it difficult to keep the criminal element out. Bluntly put, the authorities can’t keep track of who is who. Having the fingerprints on record also helps analyzing evidence easier.
If you read Korean, here’s more:
http://news.mk.co.kr/outside/v.....;no=325116
Another thing to remember is that all Koreans have their fingerprints taken when they get their Citizens IDs. So yes, it makes sense to fingerprint the foreigners, too. I just don’t see why they don’t do what the Americans and Japanese do and fingerprint every foreigner who enters the country, regardless of length of stay.
fingerprints and pictures of everyone crossing the borders. simple.
#1, Thing is, a good number of those residents were 2nd and 3rd+ gen people, not simply just recent visitors.
Well, I’m sorta for it but why stop there and fingerprint the rest of society since most foreigners have a lower crime stat (or so it’s said here…).
The rest of society is fingerprinted, as I noted, when they get their citizen ID cards.
They are probably targeting long term residence first because they can. They already have the facilities and personal to do it. It would take additional government funding to install fingerprint machines in the airport. Eventually, they will be installed.
Long term residents? How exactly do they define this? Fingerprinting was in full effect 5 years ago… meaning potentially the only people who would be fingerprinted initially are the people that have already been fingerprinted (5 years seems like a useful cutoff for ‘long term resident’). funny.