📺 KBS 60 Minutes: “아이를 팝니다 – De prijs van Koreaanse adoptie”
(uitzending 19 december 2025)
Op 19 december 2025 zond het Koreaanse onderzoeksprogramma KBS 추적 60분 (Tracking 60 Minutes) een indrukwekkende en confronterende aflevering uit over de geschiedenis van de Koreaanse interlandelijke adoptie. De titel zegt alles: “아이를 팝니다 – We verkopen kinderen.”
Het is een uitzending die diep raakt, waar dit platform sinds 1983 kritische systematische problemen in Korea blootlegt.
De aflevering laat zien hoe Korea in de afgelopen 70 jaar meer dan 170.000 kinderen naar het buitenland stuurde. Niet als uitzondering, maar als systeem. Niet als individuele tragedies, maar als een industrie die werd gevoed door armoede, stigma, gebrek aan toezicht en soms zelfs fraude en vervalsing.
De uitzending volgt verschillende geadopteerden en families die elkaar na decennia proberen terug te vinden. Hun verhalen zijn schrijnend:
- Kinderen die als “wezen” werden geregistreerd terwijl hun ouders nog leefden.
- Dossiers waarin leeftijden, namen en geboortedata bewust werden aangepast.
- Ouders die nooit toestemming gaven, maar hun kinderen toch kwijtraakten.
- Adoptiebureaus die onder druk van internationale vraag steeds verder gingen.
- Families die pas na 40 of 50 jaar ontdekken wat er werkelijk is gebeurd.
De aflevering laat ook zien hoe Korea nu — eindelijk — erkent dat 56 geadopteerden officieel zijn aangemerkt als slachtoffers van ernstige mensenrechtenschendingen. Maar tegelijk wordt duidelijk dat het systeem nog steeds worstelt met verantwoordelijkheid, transparantie en juridische mogelijkheden voor herstel.
Voor Nederlandse geadopteerden is het pijnlijk, maar ook helend om te zien dat Korea deze geschiedenis nu openlijk onderzoekt. Het geeft ruimte voor waarheid, voor herstel, en voor een gesprek dat te lang is uitgesteld.
“34,931 views — December 20, 2025
Episode 1436 — We Sell Children: The Bare Face of Overseas Adoption
Broadcast date: Friday, December 19, 2025, 10 PM
South Korea has sent more children overseas for adoption than any other country in the world. For 70 years, without a single break, children were sent abroad every year. According to government estimates, about 170,000 children have left Korea through overseas adoption. Korea’s overseas adoption system began in the 1950s to address the issue of war orphans. However, during the rapid economic growth of the 1970s and 1980s, the number of children sent abroad actually increased dramatically. In 1985 alone, about 8,800 children were adopted overseas — 1.3 out of every 100 newborns. Why were so many children sent abroad during this period?
As adults, adoptees return to Korea. They say their adoption processes were filled with manipulation and lies. They visit adoption agencies and government offices to find their records, but the information they can obtain is extremely limited. Why do adoptees, who simply want to know who they are and who their families are, speak so desperately? Tracking 60 Minutes met with overseas adoptees, their families, and those involved at the time to uncover what really happened — the bare face of overseas adoption.
■ Searching for Birth Parents
Koo Sang-pil, adopted to Belgium at age four, suffered severe racial discrimination throughout his childhood. Only in middle age did he come to Korea to search for his birth parents, but almost no records remain in his adoption file. Even when he visited the temporary care facility and adoption agency where he had stayed, there was almost no information. One word remained in his memory: Busan. Clinging to even the smallest clue, Sang-pil traveled to Busan. Will he be able to find the mother he has longed for his entire life?
“If my mother had me at 20, she would now be 78. If she had me at 18, she would be 76. I wonder if I will be able to see the mother who brought me into this world before she passes away.”
■ A Missing Child Turned ‘Orphan’ — Parents Searching for Their Lost Children
In the summer of 1975, Choi Young-ja lost her 4‑year‑old son. The boy followed a fumigation truck outside and disappeared three days before his birthday. The family searched police stations, orphanages, and adoption agencies. Forty‑eight years later, a DNA test by an organization finally located him. Shockingly, he had been adopted to a family in Norway that same winter. Although his parents had never given consent, the child was sent abroad as an “orphan” with a changed name and birthdate. He grew up believing he was an orphan. His family, devastated by his disappearance, lived with their lives shattered. What happened to them?
In the 1970s and 1980s, cases of non-orphan children being adopted overseas increased, becoming a major social issue. Experts explain that adoption agencies likely competed to send children abroad because overseas adoption generated valuable foreign currency. One anonymous insider revealed that agencies made employees compete to secure children and even operated a performance-based bonus system. Parents who had no idea their children were adopted overseas searched desperately for them. Even after being reunited, their sense of injustice remains unresolved.
“They weren’t war orphans. Their parents were alive and well.
What other country would do something like this?
Is there another country that sold children like this?”
■ A Hospital That Lied: “Your Baby Was Stillborn” — Why Did They Do This?
Mia, adopted to Denmark in 1988, learned a shocking truth after meeting her Korean birth parents. Her parents had been told she died during childbirth. When they asked to see the body so they could hold a funeral, the doctor refused. Yet her adoption file states: “Due to the father’s insufficient income, the parents consent to sending the child for overseas adoption.” Why did this happen?
People involved at the time admitted that adoption agencies aggressively promoted and marketed overseas adoption to secure children, and many problems arose in the process. In 1988, during a meeting of agency directors, the government criticized adoption agencies for having degenerated into human‑trafficking operations and focusing solely on acquiring massive real‑estate holdings. Is this true? The Tracking 60 Minutes team investigated the actual real‑estate assets of adoption agencies.
“I believe the crimes were truly organized. So many people were involved in stealing children, sending them for adoption, and making enormous amounts of money.”
■ 56 Victims of Severe Human Rights Violations Recognized — What Comes Next?
In March 2025, the Truth and Reconciliation Commission recognized 56 overseas adoptees as victims of severe human rights violations. The Commission stated that overseas adoption had become industrialized, leading to the commodification of children. Victims suffered through illegal adoption approvals, identity laundering, falsified documents, and the creation of fake orphan records. However, the Commission’s recommendations have no legal force, and the government has not implemented any concrete measures. Experts point out that the 56 victims must individually file lawsuits or compensation claims against the state.
After acknowledging illegal practices in adoption processes, several Nordic countries suspended overseas adoptions. As of 2025, only two OECD countries continue overseas adoption: South Korea and Colombia. At a time when the country is grappling with population decline and low birth rates, we must reconsider whether overseas adoption is still a necessary system.
Episode 1436 of Tracking 60 Minutes, “We Sell Children – The Bare Face of Overseas Adoption,” aired on KBS 1TV on Friday, December 19, 2025, at 10 PM.”