Original article in Korean is at this link.

34-year-old E, from Nigeria, went into an Italian restaurant in Itaewon in May of 2007 and ordered some food, only to be told by an employee to “please show me your ID card.”

“I just came here to have something to eat, why should I show you my identification?” she asked, and was told that “I need to confirm you are a black person.”

There are others who have suffered racial discrimination at this restaurant. Another Nigerian named O was asked to show identification. Even after showing it, the employee said that “blacks and Nigerians may not use this restaurant.” O’s American spouse U tried to speak but because of the Nigerian citizenship they were turned away. The restaurant said that “recently there have been problems caused by Nigerians so we are not letting them in.”

Finally, E sent a petition to the National Human Rights Commission (국가인권위원회). The Commission told the restaurant that “banning entrance by Nigerians simply because other Nigerians have caused problems constitutes discrimination on the basis of race and nationality… you must cease this action.”

29-year-old Bonojit Hussein, an Indian research professor at Sungkonghoe University, was on a bus in July of 2009 when 32-year-old Mr. Park told him that he was “dirty” and “smelled bad”. Prof. Hussein’s female Korean friend received insults such as “you Chosun (expletive), how do you feel dating a foreign darkie?”

Prof. Hussein reported Mr. Park to the police, but the police officer wanted him to “reach a settlement if you can” and did not investigate. Furthermore, the police officer even said that “you were only born in 1982, how can you be professor? What do you actually do?” Prof. Hussein sent a petition to the Commission, which advised the police to institute human rights training.

At the end of last year there were 1.26 million resident foreigners, 2% of the total population. However, there is widespread discrimination against foreigners on the basis of race or skin color. It has been less than one year since the expression “skin color” in crayons was judged to be racially discriminatory. On the internet there are comments such as “three reasons to stop southeast Asian (expletives) coming to Korea to work or get married” and “no Muslim should be allowed within two kilometers of the G-20 meeting.” The Commission recently sent a report on racially discriminatory internet comments to the heads of the Ministry of Justice (법무부) and the (한국인터넷자율정책기구이사회).

Petitions to the Commission alleging discrimination on the basis of race or nationality are increasing yearly. Experts say that “discriminatory acts occur because of the strongly-held beliefs in ethnic superiority and that our race is purer than other nations… On the other hand, resident foreigners are increasingly aware of their rights and that increases the number of petitions.”

The Commission announced on July 26 that over the 10-year period from November of 2001 through May of this year it had received 230 petitions alleging discrimination on the basis of nationality, ethnicity, or skin color. There were 213 cases involving nationality, 10 cases involving ethnicity, and 7 cases involving skin color.

There were 50 cases involving discrimination on the basis of race. Through 2008 there were very few, but there were 22 in 2009 and 12 in 2010. Since 2007 there have been 103 cases involving religious discrimination.

Jeong Jin-seong, professor of sociology at Seoul National University, said that “the continuing prevalence of discrimination against foreigners is due to the lack of experience our country has had with ethnicities from outside the Korean peninsula… Globally, there are few countries that are as racially homogeneous is our country… It is also due to the belief that no country can compete with our schools.” Foreign workers began entering the country in the 1990s, and international marriage came up in the 2000s, and because of the long-standing racial homogeneity foreigners are unfamiliar and experience hostility and ostracism.

Oh Chang-ik, head of a human rights group (인권연대), said that “we still have few multicultural people compared to other countries, but there needs to be national effort to reduce discrimination to prevent something like the recent massacre in Norway… The terrorist in Norway said that his goal was to be like Korea and Japan, which is shameful for us… Starting now we must work to built a multicultural society.”