“Right to know one’s parents.” Denmark sued for illegally adopted South Koreans

Eight people born in South Korea and illegally adopted in Denmark are suing the Danish state for the role it played in their adoptions, demanding that it take responsibility for covering up their origins.

Now 52 years old, Sophie Randel he was three years old when he arrived in Denmark with his younger brother in 1977, during a period of authoritarian rule in South Korea.

Lively and talkative child, at the time spoke Korean fluentlyand the adoptive father recorded it on a cassette tape that ended up collecting dust for years.

In 2023, Randel handed the recording to a journalistwho would later accompany her on her quest to discover her origins.

Little by little, through the conversation in which reconstituted his arrival to Denmark and some research done in South Korea, Randel discovered a different story from what was stated of your Danish adoption documents.

Based on these documents, believed that she had been abandoned on the streetcom the brother wrapped in cloths behind his back and the names and ages of both pinned to their clothes. But instead he discovered that their mother had entrusted them to an orphanageat a time when the family was facing financial difficulties.

Instead of being cared for in the orphanagethe two brothers were adopted together, in Denmark, witho tens of thousands of other children sent abroad under a practice sanctioned by the South Korean state, that lasted decades.

In South Korea, the three older brothers and sister always waited see them again. She and her brother ended up reuniting with the brothers em 2023.

“They looked for us for 45 years“, Randel told AFP, wiping away tears. She and her brother did not they knew someone was looking for them.

Randel believes that the Danish authorities, for their part, tried to “maintain the hidden story”, telling them that they had been abandoned.

Adoption survey

South Korea sent more than 140 thousand children for adoption abroad between 1955 and 1999, according to an official survey carried out in the country. In October 2025, Seoul apologized for the first time for abusive practices sanctioned by the State, stating that “unjust violations of human rights” were committed.

Between 1970 and 1989, 7,220 South Korean children were adopted in Denmark, almost all presented as orphans abandoned on the street. Surveys proved otherwise, indicating that South Korean children in orphanages were given up for adoption without the families’ consent.

A 2024 report by the National Social Resources Board showed that Danish state-run adoption agencies knew that South Korean partners sometimes changed the identity of children.

According to the Danish press, the country’s agencies paid around 54 million Danish crowns (7.2 million euros) to facilitate adoptions.

“As a Dane, I believed that Denmark was on the side of the good and that Korea, as a former dictatorship, was on the side of the bad guys,” said Peter Moller, who runs an association defending the rights of South Korean adoptees that is not part of the case against the Danish state.

“But Korea had the courage to look head on for what he did”, while “the Denmark prefers to sweep everything under the rug”, he stated.

Adopted meets her father

Also Sit Koch Jorgensena 53-year-old physiotherapist and adoptee, is outraged. “It is a human right to know our identity and also have the possibility of contacting the biological family”, she said, visibly angry.

Inaccuracies in her adoption documents prevented her from doing so for years, but You are now near the end of your searchwhich began with a first trip to South Korea in 2013.

“A month before leaving, I received an email saying that they had found my father“, he said. “It was a shock.” He met him during that visit and discovered that the true circumstances of the separation of the biological family were very different from what was stated in the adoption documents.

While the father was out of the country, her grandmother sent her to a “camp” to be cared for, without his consent. Instead of remaining in the field, the child was sent to Denmark for adoption.

“I want the Danish Government to take responsibility for having shown so much negligence,” Jorgensen added. “It was the authorities who should check everything, see if there was cause for concern.”

Each of the plaintiffs is asking for compensation of 250,000 Danish crowns (33,400 euros). Contacted by AFP, Denmark’s Ministry of Social Affairs declined to comment.

A Denmark suspended international adoptions in 2024after several serious problems related to international adoption practices became public.