By Kim Rahn
Staff Reporter
Sex workers in red-light districts plan to form a nationwide organization to claim their occupational rights. Some 5,000 sex workers from brothels across the nation will hold a massive meeting at Olympic Gymnastics Stadium in Chamsil, southeastern Seoul, on Wednesday, according to a committee preparing to launch a pan-national sex workers’ coalition.

``We will launch a coalition and urge the government to abolish the anti-prostitution law and recognize us as laborers,’’ Lee Son-hee, a member of the committee, told The Korea Times.



About 600 sex workers and brothel operators shout slogans to call on the government to stop its crackdown on the sex trade and take measures to protect their livelihood during a rally in a red-light district of Wanwol-dong in the southeastern port city of Pusan, in this file photo.
/ Korea Times

The government has enforced the law since last September and has cracked down on the sex trade, especially in red-light districts nationwide. The measure was aimed at helping sexually exploited victims of brothels and end prostitution.
However, many sex workers have opposed the law, claiming the measure hampers their livelihood.

``We urge the government to abolish the law that says sex trade is crime. It is not right to legally regulate an individual’s sexual rights,’’ Lee said.

``We also want people to recognize us as sex workers, not as prostitutes. Women’s groups have claimed housework is labor and thus housewives are laborers. We consider our work to be labor also,’’ the 33-year-old Lee said.

She added they will also urge the government to give them social welfare benefits like ordinary workers. ``We have sometimes been oppressed by those buying sex. We want equal status with them, and that would be real help for us,’’ she said.

Along with enforcement of the anti-prostitution law, the authorities have provided rehabilitation support, such as subsidies, for those who they recognize have been involuntarily engaged in the sex industry, or sex trade ``victims.’’

``The government limited the victims to only those working in red-light districts in Wanwol-dong, Pusan, and Sungui-dong, Inchon, so sex workers in other districts do not qualify for government subsidies. If we stop our work, we cannot survive,’’ Lee claimed.

She added her earnings have deceased by 70 percent since the law’s enforcement.

The Ministry of Gender Equality and Family, however, stands firm with the anti-sex trade law.

The workers staged sit-in rallies in front of the National Assembly building in Yoido after the anti-prostitution law took effect last September. They urged the government stop, or at least, suspend enforcement of the law until they find alternative ways to keep their livelihood.

``But law enforcement cannot be suspended at the request of specific groups,’’ Kim Ki-hwan, the ministry’s women’s rights planning division official, said.

``They try to persuade people with the claim about the difficulties of making a living. But those women who have worked in red-light districts for a long time do not try to find other jobs and cannot easily adapt themselves to the government’s rehabilitation support programs,’’ Kim said.

Lee and the committee plan to urge the government to discus the issue with them. But Kim said that the government side and sex workers had talks several times last year when the women staged rallies, but failed to reach any agreements.

About 9,000-10,000 sex workers worked at red-light districts nationwide in 2002, according to the ministry. The number was 6,000 in 35 districts last year just before the law took effect, but it decreased to 2,500 this year after the law enforcement.

rahnita@koreatimes.co.kr