Court allows defector to divorce N. Korean spouse

By Kim Bo-eun

A court has allowed a North Korean defector to divorce her husband in the North as she wanted to register a child she had with another man in the South.

The Seoul Family Court ruled in favor of the woman, whose name was withheld, according to the Korea Legal Aid Corporation, Sunday.

She came to the South in 2011, leaving her husband behind. She met a fellow defector here and had a daughter with him in 2013.

However, she was still legally married to her husband in the North, and could not register her child as the fellow defector’s daughter. Unable to get proper welfare benefits without registration, she then tried to register the girl as the child of her husband in the North, but the district office rejected it.

The woman filed the divorce suit with help from the corporation.

The first such suit was filed in 2004 when a defector who had left her husband in the North sought to remarry here. A local court said at that time that it was too harsh to force a defector to continue a marital relationship with a spouse in the North as they could not meet or have contact with each other.