Taiwanese YouTuber assaulted in Hongdae after rejecting attackers' advances

Photos on social media show a Taiwanese woman with bruises after an assault in Hongdae by two Korean men. Captured from her social media

A Taiwanese YouTuber has alleged that she and a friend were assaulted by two Korean men in Seoul’s Hongdae area after refusing their advances, sparking criticism of the police response.

According to Taiwan’s FTV and other local outlets, the YouTuber, identified only as A, said she was walking with her friend in Mapo District on Sunday when two men approached them.

The men allegedly suggested “spending a night together” and touched her friend's shoulder and hair without consent. When A told them to stop, an argument broke out, and she said the men struck her face and limbs, leaving bruises and a fractured thumb.

“I never thought I would be beaten just for rejecting their proposal,” A said, adding that she reported the incident immediately while holding the suspects at the scene until officers arrived five minutes later.

She claimed police did little beyond checking her passport number and released the men without detaining them.

Initially, the Mapo Police Station announced at 9:50 a.m. on Wednesday that “a Chinese man in his 20s assaulted two Taiwanese women,” and said the man was taken in for questioning before being released.

The woman disputed this, insisting the attackers were Korean, noting their fluency in Korean and that they carried Korean identification.

By 4:40 p.m., police issued a correction, acknowledging that the case involved “a mutual assault between a Taiwanese woman and a Korean man.”

They explained that they had confused the case with another assault involving a Chinese man and a Taiwanese woman in the same area just hours later.

This article from the Hankook Ilbo, the sister publication of The Korea Times, is translated by a generative AI and edited by The Korea Times.