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Korea Herald
04-07-2025
- Korea Herald
Is it time for Korea to outlaw leaving children home alone?
Legal expert says law needed not for punishment, but to prevent tragedies A recent wave of deadly house fires involving children left home alone has reignited discussions in South Korea about introducing laws to prevent such tragedies. Two young sisters, aged 8 and 6, were killed in a fire that broke out in a sixth-floor apartment in Gijang-gun, Busan, at around 10:58 p.m. Wednesday, according to the Busan Fire Services. Authorities believe the fire began with an electrical malfunction near a standing air conditioner in the living room. The sisters died in the fire while their parents were out working at their restaurant late at night. The tragedy left the neighborhood in shock. 'Everyone knows the family. The parents have been running a restaurant here for years. My heart aches when I think about those little girls trapped in the fire. They were just trying to make ends meet, like any other parents,' said Kim Hyun-ok, 45, who lives in the same apartment building, in an interview with a local news outlet. Wednesday's fire came just nine days after a similar tragedy in the same city, where two sisters, aged 10 and 7, died while sleeping alone in their apartment. The incident occurred around 4:15 a.m. on June 24 on the fourth floor of an apartment building. Their parents, who worked as cleaners, had already left for their early morning shifts. Four months earlier, on Feb. 26, a 12-year-old girl lost her life in a blaze at a villa in Seo-gu, Incheon. The fire broke out around 10:43 a.m. while her father was at the hospital for dialysis treatment, and her mother had gone to work at a restaurant. Growing calls for legal protection Home is no longer a safe place for children left unattended. Out of the 108,759 child safety incidents reported between 2021 and 2023, nearly half (50,906) took place at home, according to the National Fire Agency, far outnumbering the 9,515 cases that occurred in schools, according to the National Fire Agency. But many children are left home alone after school, waiting for parents who are out working. According to a 2020 survey by the Korea Institute for Health and Social Affairs, 23.1 percent of elementary school students nationwide spent time alone at home after school. The survey was conducted among 5,050 parents. There is no existing legislation in South Korea that bans parents from leaving their children at home alone, but a recent string of fire accidents has reignited demands for such a law. "Korean society has long treated the reality of children being left home alone as unavoidable, often putting the burden of earning a living ahead of child safety. But recent tragedies force us to ask: Should making a living ever come before a child's life?" said Choi Seo-jeong, a 27-year-old graduate student in Seoul. In the United States, leaving a child alone is considered a form of child neglect and is legally prohibited. For instance, in Maryland, it is illegal to leave a child under the age of 8 unattended, while Illinois prohibits leaving children under 14 alone. If a child left alone is injured or killed in a fire or other accident, the parent may face criminal charges. Some local legal experts support the idea of similar legislation here, not to punish parents after accidents, but to prevent such tragedies from happening in the first place. 'The law should clearly define the age below which children cannot be left home alone, and that definition needs to consider differences in maturity and development,' Jeon Min-kyung, an attorney at the law firm Onyul, told The Korea Herald. She also stressed the importance of including exceptions in the law, especially for vulnerable families such as single mothers or households where grandparents are primary caregivera, saying "Without thoughtful exemptions, the law could end up hurting the very families it's meant to protect.' 'If a law mandating that children not be left alone is introduced with specific and reasonable conditions, it could help expand public support systems like nighttime or weekend child care services," she added.
Korea Herald
03-07-2025
- Korea Herald
Busan fire kills 2 children left alone at home
Girls aged 8, 6 sustain fatal injuries while both of their parents were out working Two girls aged 8 and 6 were killed in an apartment fire that occurred Wednesday night, in an echo of a similar tragedy that happened last week. The fire, whose origin is not yet known, occurred at around 10:58 p.m. at the sixth-floor unit of an apartment complex in Gijang-gun, Busan, according to the Busan Fire Services. Firefighters who arrived on the scene pried opened the door and found the two young victims, lying on the floor unconscious. The younger of the sisters was found near the front door, while her sister was found in front of the balcony. They were taken to a hospital for emergency medical treatment, but were ultimately pronounced dead. Police investigation found that neither of their parents were home when the tragedy struck. The sisters were brought home 20 minutes before the disaster by their mother, who left two minutes later. The fire led to evacuation of 100 residents of the apartment complex, inflicting about 28 million won ($20,641) worth of damage to the building. Police found that the apartment building did not have a sprinkler system, but its fire alarm system was functional. Local police and fire authorities are conducting investigation to determine the exact cause of the fire, with police having yet to find any indications of criminal intent as of Thursday morning. Testimonies from the residents showed that there had been repeated power failures for 2 1/2 hours before the fire, although it is unclear whether they were connected to the flames. Many children left alone at home A similar incident occurred in the same city barely a week before, when an apartment fire killed two girls aged 7 and 10 in in Busanjin-gu on June 24 at around 4:15 a.m. The parents of the children were out working. South Korea law does not have a clause banning parents from leaving their children alone at home. A growing population of locals are opting to use help for child care in their absence, with local babysitter service Mom-Sitter accumulating 1.44 million users as of July. But a substantial portion of the population still leave their children at home unattended for at least few hours a day, particularly if both parents have jobs. A 2020 report by the Ministry of Gender Equality and Family, showed that 93.8 percent of the respondents did not leave their young children — those who did not start school —alone at home, but children who were left alone spent a daily average of 152.1 minutes by themselves. Among parents of elementary school students, 38.3 percent said they leave their children alone for an average of 285.2 minutes a day, while 72.3 percent of middle and high school students were left without supervision for a daily average of 331.4 minutes.
