Justice Minister Han Dong-hoon speaks during a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) signing ceremony with Seongnam City Office on cooperative measures to improve the medical welfare of detainees at correction facilities, held at Seongnam City Hall, Gyeonggi Province, Wednesday. Yonhap

Human rights activists are lambasting the Ministry of Justice's plan to strengthen refugee screening by letting authorities reject or revoke the asylum applications or statuses of people who may "damage national security."

The activists argue that the move, which goes against the spirit of the International Convention on Refugees, shows that the Korean government is pursuing border policies strictly based on national interest instead of inclusivity.

The justice ministry made a pre-announcement of a revision bill to the Refugee Act, Wednesday, seeking to add a clause allowing the government to deny refugee status to asylum seekers who may "damage national security, maintenance of social order or public welfare."

Under the current law, the conditions for refugee denials are crimes against humanity, war crimes, grave non-political crimes or acts that violate principles outlined by the United Nations.

The revision bill would also enable the government to revoke refugee status if an individual is found to have committed such acts before obtaining the status. In other words, if someone who was granted refugee status is later found to have a record of "harming national security" in their home country, the ministry can overturn its decision and revoke their status.

Lee Il, a lawyer with Advocates for Public Interest Law (APIL), criticized the justice ministry for not properly following the 1951 Refugee Convention that Korea ratified in 1992.

"Countries that have ratified the refugee convention are obliged to provide protection to asylum seekers who meet the conditions stipulated in the treaty. However, the justice ministry has long demonstrated an attitude of not complying with the rules based on arbitrary decisions, with the latest revision bill being one of them," he told The Korea Times.

Once legislated, the revision bill is expected to toughen Korea's standards for refugee acceptance, already considered one of the strictest in the world. In 2022, the nation's refugee acceptance rate stood at a mere two percent, according to data from the justice ministry, which was the lowest among OECD nations.

The Ministry of Justice building in Gwacheon, Gyeonggi Province / Yonhap

Announcing the revision bill, Justice Minister Han Dong-hoon said on Tuesday that the new laws will prevent terrorists from entering the country as refugees.

"Until now, there has been a lack of a legal basis to prevent terrorists and potential suspects from being recognized as refugees," he said in a statement.

"Through this amendment, the refugee vetting process will be able to prioritize the safety of our nation and our people, and this is the global standard."

Regarding this, Kim Yeon-joo, a lawyer at Nancen, a Seoul-based refugee support center, denounced the justice ministry for conflating refugees with terrorists, a narrative often used by anti-refugee groups.

"Determining whether a person poses a threat to national security can be very difficult. It's not just about what's written in their documents because, in some countries, civic activists who engaged in anti-state protests are labeled as terrorists by their government," she said.

In that regard, she expressed concerns that the revision bill could be abused by immigration authorities to screen out asylum seekers – or even revoke their refugee status – without taking into account the complicated political and religious environment of each nation.

The Seoul representation of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), for its part, said it is reviewing the details of the planned revision bill.

From a wider perspective, critics say that the government's move to toughen refugee screening procedures aligns with its broader plan to carry out immigration policies based on national interests and not from a humanitarian perspective.

At a National Assembly session last week, Han vowed that his ministry, which is set to launch a separate organization handling immigration affairs, will only accept foreign nationals who meet the nation's standards based on thorough assessments.

Lee at APIL criticized the minister's stance of prioritizing national interests over diversity, which could worsen the discrimination and prejudice faced by immigrants in Korea.

"For the past few decades, the government's stance toward migrants has been that they can be exploited as virtual slaves for the benefit of Koreans. Apparently, this remains unchanged even as the nation is preparing to launch an immigration agency," he said.