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Court will decide if ‘primitive’ statute is constitutional
September 09, 2009
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The ministry said yesterday that it had delivered its opinion to the Constitutional Court that the statute should be scrapped because it discriminated against men and suggested that women are unable to exercise their right to sexual autonomy. “The statue was based on past criminal codes which forced women to uphold their chastity,” said Jo Jin-wu, head of the women’s policy cooperation division in the ministry. “The view of treating women only as victims is also discriminatory.” The ministry’s comments come ahead of a hearing at the Constitutional Court on Thursday on the fate of the statute. It’s the first time that the government has made public its position. Currently, according to Article 304 of Korea’s Penal Code, “a person who induces a female not habitually immoral to engage in sexual intercourse under pretense of marriage or through other fraudulent means, shall be punished by imprisonment for not more than two years or by a fine not exceeding five million won ($4,058).” In 2002, seven of the nine judges at the Constitutional Court ruled that the statute was constitutional after a challenge was made against the law. The court will take another look at the article on Thursday following a petition filed last year by a 33-year-old man who was indicted on charges of conning a woman into having sex with him under the pretense of marriage. The man has asked the Constitutional Court to review the legality of the article, claiming that the statute violates his right to pursue happiness and the right to sexual autonomy. “The statute is primitive, created in the era when women were treated as inferior to men,” said the man’s lawyer, Hwang Chang-Il, who claims that only three countries around the world - Korea, Turkey and Romania - punish sexual intercourse under the pretense of marriage. According to the Constitutional Court, most states in the United States do not punish the act, while some states have similar statutes under the laws governing rape. Germany abolished a similar criminal statute in 1969. However, the Justice Ministry said the statute does not violate the principle of proportionality: the punishment was not in excess of the crime, although it agreed that it limited the right to sexual autonomy and privacy. According to the ministry, women are still considered “weak” and said the statue is meant to protect them. The Confucian community agrees. “Marriage is a process of realizing sacred values in Korea’s tradition, and any acts that violate it should be punished,” said Jeon Hong-sik, secretary general of the Damsu Association, a Confucian group. “Women are more likely than men to be victims of such crimes and the law must remain unchanged. The Gender Equality Ministry must speak for women’s rights, and it is hard to understand the ministry’s position that the statute is unconstitutional,” he said. According to the Korean Women’s Development Institute, few petitions against men accused under this law go to court. In 2007, 41 of the 572 petitions filed faced an indictment. By Ser Myo-ja, Kim Seung-hyun [myoja@joongang.co.kr] |
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