Yemeni Refugees in Jeju Island, South Korea: Challenges of Legal Protection Reflected in Cultural Discrepancy and Anti-Refugee Sentiment of South Korea
By: Lydia Lee, Contributing Writer
The singularity of the 2018 Yemeni refugees in Jeju Island, South Korea, lies in the distinct characteristic of the incident. The number of Yemeni refugees in South Korea was around 10 people or less until 2016, but in early 2018, around 550 Yemeni refugees entered Jeju Island and the majority of them sought refugee status. The mass influx of Yemeni refugees in Jeju Island, South Korea and their current status have revealed the South Koreans’ reluctance to accept outsiders.
The challenges of Yemeni Refugees in South Korea trace back to South Korea’s refugee history. Although South Korea acceded to the 1951 Refugee Convention and its 1967 Protocol Relating to the Status of Refugees in 1992, in 2018, only 33 percent of 1,016 Korean citizens showed approval of accepting refugees. Throughout the year 2000–2017, South Korea granted refugee status to only 708 people, which is 3.5 percent of total refugee status applicants. Moreover, the 2008 report concerning the human rights of refugees in South Korea, published by the National Human Rights Commission of Korea, evidenced that people with refugee status, humanitarian stay permits, and refugee applicants in South Korea all experienced lack of sufficient institutional protection including medical support, resources for basic livelihood, translation, and employments. To overcome these challenges and limitations on protecting the human rights of the refugees, the South Korean government made its own Refugee Act in 2012 and has enforced the provisions since 2013. The refugee protection provisions included the rights to education, support for medical help and living expenses, and non-refoulment. Nevertheless, there is a brutal dichotomy between institutional policy development and the actual willingness to practice among Korean citizens. Among the 1,016 participants of the survey, 91 percent of them said that they believed that accepting refugees would cause “economic burdens on the South Korean government and citizens.”
The evacuation of Yemeni people from their homes due to a sudden mass influx in Jeju Island has its roots in the Yemen Civil War from late 2014. Yemen has been suffering from the internal war between the Saudi-led coalition and Iranian-backed Houthi forces. During this conflict, more than 17,500 civilians were killed and injured, 69 percent of Yemen’s population required humanitarian or protection assistance such as food and safe water, and more than 2 million people involuntarily fled their homes.
Upon leaving Yemen, Yemeni refugees found Jeju Island, South Korea, as it opened up on Yemeni refugees as an alternative opportunity to resettle. Before the pandemic, Jeju also maintained a Visa Waiver Program for 180 countries, including Yemen, for 30 days upon entrance. Unlike mainland Korea, which had terminated the Visa Waiver Program for the Yemeni in July 2014, Jeju and its Visa Waiver Program enabled Yemeni to enter and apply for refugee status until 2018. In 2016–18, Yemeni people entering Jeju soared from 10 in 2016 and 52 in 2017 to 561 in 2018.
However, their entrance into South Korea brought the inherent challenges of the protection gap and conflicts with South Koreans to the surface. The protection gap of the legal protection in South Korea could be exemplified by two main protection statuses of Yemeni people in South Korea: refugee status and humanitarian stay permits.
In the Refugee Act of South Korea (“Refugee Act”), a refugee is defined as a “foreigner who is unable or does not desire to receive protection from the nation of his or her nationality in well-grounded fear that he or she is likely to be persecuted based on race, religion (…), or political opinion or a stateless foreigner who is unable or does not desire to return to the nation in which he or she resided before entering the Republic of Korea.” Once given refugee status in South Korea, he or she is granted various rights, such as seeking employment without getting permission, education, and social security.
However, while only two of the 484 Yemeni applicants of 2018 were granted refugee status, 412 people were given humanitarian stay permits. In the Refugee Act, humanitarian stay permits are given to humanitarian sojourners, those who do not qualify for the refugee status but “foreigner granted a stay permit (…) as a person who has rational grounds for recognizing that his or her life, personal liberty, etc. is very likely to be infringed by torture, other inhumane treatment or punishment or other events.”
As such, the Refugee Act acknowledges that the danger that humanitarian sojourners face is also destructive. Ironically, however, most of the rights that apply to the refugee status do not apply to the humanitarian stay, as there is only one provision in the Refugee Act concerning the humanitarian sojourners, which is about the permission of employment. There are also restrictions on traveling, seeking employment, and family gatherings. These drastic differences between their rights, in reality, intensify the protection gap in South Korea, as only two selected people–among the people who are in similar or worse situations–are granted practical rights for their life in South Korea.
The reason behind South Korea’s strict refugee standard and acceptance rate remains unclear, but there could be a potential political influence originating from the sentiment of South Korean citizens. In July 2018, after the mass influx of Yemeni Refugees, more than 714,000 people in South Korea signed a petition urging former president Moon Jae-in to reject Yemeni applications for asylum and refugee status. The petition alleged that they were “fake refugees” only “seeking to take advantage of South Korea’s economic stability.”
To resolve this rooted prejudice that led to the protectional gap, institutional protection has improved over time to make practical solutions that could be conducive for both Jeju residents and Yemeni refugees. For instance, to guarantee the protection of Yemeni refugees in actual danger and to resolve the anti-refugee sentiment of the Korean public, the Minister of Justice promised to strengthen the Refugee Screening Process. This was aimed at identifying the “fake refugees” who are in South Korea just for employment purposes or criminals. Furthermore, Jeju Provincial Council encouraged the employment and settlement of Yemeni refugees, such as providing accommodations for them and organizing an employment fair for South Korean employers and Yemeni employees.
The efforts of institutional protection succeeded in bringing some positive changes in the lives of Yemen refugees in Jeju Island. For employment, the number of Yemeni employees in the Jeju workforce increased to 270 people after the employment fair, and the accommodation for Yemeni refugees increased from 17 to 36 buildings with the help of non-governmental organizations.
However, those efforts resulted in conflicts with Jeju residents and consequently affected their settlement and employment. Most Yemeni employees being Muslim and following their religious practices, such as prayer time, also led to conflict with their Jeju employers, and the working population decreased to 200 people. Moreover, Jeju Islanders’ disapproval of their settlement led to multiple protests, such as the protests against the Yemeni residing near the school zone, which forced the Yemeni to move. The deeply engraved anti-refugee sentiment towards the Yemeni did not only affect the daily lives of the Yemeni, but it also impacted the practicality of existing and new legal protection policies. The institutional protection policy’s efforts and limitations convey that the mere fulfillment of physical needs could not be a long-term solution to the protection gap. Nevertheless, there is still room for improvement, as Jeju subsequently started the education of Yemeni and Korean culture to the employers and employees after the initial failure of the employment fair.
“Jeju is my home and I love everything here, but I still have difficulties in raising my children because there is no governmental support because of my visa,” remarked Mohammed in 2023, a Yemeni humanitarian sojourner who has lived in Jeju Island, South Korea since 2018. His remark portrays the current life of Yemeni refugees in Jeju Island, who have integrated themselves into the culture and society of Jeju Island in the past couple of years. This, nevertheless, captures the unresolved challenges that the Yemeni refugees would have to face as long as they live with the stigma of “refugees” instead of “member(s) of society” in South Korea.
