Gyeonggi Province: "Disaster Income Does Not Discriminate Against Foreigners"… Mid- to Long-Term Review Underway

[Asia Economy (Suwon) = Reporter Lee Young-gyu] Gyeonggi Province clarified that it is not true that it failed to comply with the recommendations of the National Human Rights Commission by not providing the COVID-19 'Emergency Disaster Income' to foreigners.

The province further stated that it is considering the provision of disaster income to foreigners as a mid- to long-term task.

In a clarification released on the 27th, the province said, "Some media reported that Gyeonggi Province did not accept the National Human Rights Commission's recommendations and did not provide disaster basic income to general foreign residents," adding, "Gyeonggi Province has submitted an implementation plan regarding the National Human Rights Commission's improvement recommendations on providing disaster basic income to foreigners."

The province explained that through the implementation plan, it conveyed to the Human Rights Commission that in order to grant foreign residents the same qualifications as domestic residents to receive disaster income, public discussion and revision of the provincial council ordinance are necessary.

It also added that if additional disaster income is provided to them, the province's financial burden and fiscal conditions must be taken into account.

The province estimates that providing 100,000 KRW per person in disaster income to 490,000 foreigners, excluding marriage immigrants and permanent residents among the 590,000 foreigners, would require approximately 50 billion KRW in additional funds.

A provincial official pointed out, "It is problematic to simply compare Gyeonggi Province, which provided disaster basic income to all residents regardless of age or income criteria without considering such circumstances, with Seoul City, which applied a selective criterion of 100% or less of the median income to provide emergency disaster living expenses, and report that Gyeonggi did not provide (disaster income) while Seoul did (provide disaster living expenses)."

The official added, "Gyeonggi Province plans to comprehensively review in the future whether treating all foreigners equally with domestic residents is an equitable policy."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.