US parental child abduction report cites S. Korea, 14 others for pattern of convention noncompliance
A sign for the US Department of State outside its headquarters building in the Foggy Bottom neighborhood of Washington, April 15. AFP-Yonhap
An annual U.S. report on international parental child abduction (IPCA) cited South Korea and 14 other countries as demonstrating a "pattern of noncompliance" with a multilateral treaty, the State Department said Friday.
It released the 2025 Annual Report on IPCA — a report that previously cited South Korea in 2022, 2023 and last year for showing a pattern of noncompliance with the 1980 Hague Abduction Convention that requires a country to expeditiously return a child held by a parent to the child's country of habitual residence.
The convention has been in force between the United States and South Korea since 2013.
The countries cited in the 2025 report are Korea, Argentina, The Bahamas, Belize, Brazil, Bulgaria, Ecuador, Egypt, Honduras, India, Jordan, Peru, Poland, Romania and the United Arab Emirates.
The report pointed out that law enforcement in Korea regularly failed to enforce return orders from the judicial authorities in abduction cases.
As a result of these failures, 44 percent of requests for the return of abducted children under the convention remained unresolved for more than 12 months, the report said.
"On average, these cases were unresolved for two years and six months," it said.
Parental child abduction takes place when a child is removed from or retained outside his or her country of habitual residence, and the removal or retention violates another parent or guardian's custody rights, according to the department.
IPCA cases often occur when parents are separated or start a divorce process.