Police Commissioner Kim Chang-ryong said today (20th), “For all reports of child abuse, the chief of police will direct and supervise the process from the initial action to the termination process, and confirm the follow-up protection and support measures.”
Commissioner Kim made this statement on the Blue House website today, answering a total of five public petitions, including severe punishment for the perpetrators of child abuse deaths such as the’Jung Ini case’.
Commissioner Kim stressed that he would completely overhaul the child abuse response system to prevent recurrence of cases such as the’Jung Ini Incident’.
Commissioner Kim said, “We will build a dedicated investigation team to directly investigate cases of child abuse under the age of 13 at the Metropolitan Police Agency to strengthen the response. Even if the abuse is not clear, there are two or more reports, and if there is a doctor’s opinion that treatment is necessary, it will be separated. I will take action and investigate.”
He emphasized, “We will establish a department in charge of overseeing child abuse prevention policies at the National Police Agency, and establish a solid cooperation system with related organizations so that early detection, protection and support of child abuse, and abuse investigation work will be conducted organically.”
Commissioner Kim said, “We will expand the location and scope of the police’s access and investigation rights, and let the police directly request temporary measures to the court.” “For active law enforcement, if on-site measures were made according to reasonable judgment and manual, the law was revised to be exempted. I will also promote it.”
In order to strongly promote such recurrence prevention measures, the police will also form a’Comprehensive Response Task Force to Eliminate Child Abuse,’ with the deputy chief of the National Police Agency and the head of the National Investigation Headquarters as joint team leaders.
Minister of Health and Welfare Kwon Deok-cheol introduced additional countermeasures to improve joint child abuse-related measures announced in July last year.
Minister Kwon said, “We will strengthen the expertise and ability to carry out investigations of child abuse response personnel. We will strengthen education such as hands-on practical training so that police and child abuse officials can make detailed investigations and accurate judgments based on their expertise.” Said.
He said, “We will expand the workforce to respond to child protection and induce active participation of local governments,” he said. “We will bring out active participation of local governments by reflecting the efforts to respond to child abuse at the local level in the joint evaluation index.”
Minister Kwon said, “We will strengthen the public responsibility of the adoption system. We will support the stabilization of the attachment relationship between the child and parents through psychological counseling and child health check-ups for one year after adoption.”
In addition, he added, “We will institutionalize pre-adoption consignment to examine the process of mutual adaptation between prospective adoptive parents and children, and prepare an amendment to the’Special Adoption Act’ in the direction of strengthening the responsibility of the state and local governments in the adoption process, and legislate it as soon as possible.”
(Photo = Yonhap News)