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Kim Tong-hyung

Reporter

The Associated Press

Kim has been covering the Koreas for the AP since 2014. He has published widely read stories on North Korea’s nuclear ambitions, the dark side of South Korea’s economic rise and international adoptions of Korean children.

Website: 

https://apnews.com/author/kim-tong-hyung

Stories from Kim Tong-hyung

Choi Young-ja holds a photo of her son when he was a toddler.
Article
Mom Sues After Learning Her Missing Son Was Adopted Out of South Korea
A 72-year-old mother has filed a lawsuit against South Korea’s government and its largest adoption agency, alleging systematic failures in her forced separation from her toddler son who was sent to Norway without her consent
May 27, 2025
Peter Møller, left, Boonyoung Han, second from left, and Yooree Kim at a press conference.
Article
South Korean Truth Commission Halts Probe Into Adoption Fraud, Hundreds of Cases in Limbo
The South Korean government’s fact-finding commission has suspended its groundbreaking investigation into the extensive fraud and abuse that tainted the nation’s historic foreign adoption program
April 24, 2025
Two women kneel amid the backdrop of a press conference, facing each other and clasping hands.
Article
South Korea’s Truth Commission Says Government Responsible for Fraud and Abuse in Foreign Adoptions
South Korea’s truth commission has concluded that the government bears responsibility for facilitating a foreign adoption program rife with fraud and abuse, driven by efforts to reduce welfare costs and enabled by private agencies that often manipulated children’s backgrounds and
March 26, 2025
A woman sits behind a baby photo, her face obscured and her body visible but out of focus.
Article
Thousands of Children Adopted by Americans Are Without Citizenship. Congress Is Unwilling To Act
The U.S. celebrated saving foreign orphans. But thousands were left without citizenship, at risk of deportation, because of loopholes in American law
October 25, 2024
Rebecca Kimmel's reflection on top of glass covering artwork that shows two girls dressed in traditional Korean clothes and holding hands.
Article
Who Am I? A South Korean Adoptee Finds Answers About the Past — Just Not the Ones She Wants
Thousands of South Korean adoptees are looking to satisfy a raw, compelling urge that much of the world takes for granted: the search for identity. Rebecca Kimmel, one of them, has stumbled into a web of switched photos, made-up stories
October 15, 2024
Yooree Kim's hands on several black and white childhood photos of her and her brother and a sticker that reads have a nice day with an illustration of a young girl beating a drum.
Article
Did This Happen to Me Also? Korean Adoptees Question Their Past and Ask How To Find Their Families
Dozens of South Korean adoptees, many in tears, have responded to an investigation led by The Associated Press and documented by FRONTLINE on adoptions from South Korea. The investigation reported dubious child-gathering practices and fraudulent paperwork involving South Korea's foreign
October 3, 2024
Yooree Kim with tears in her eyes.
Article
Western Nations Were Desperate for Korean Babies. Now Many Adoptees Believe They Were Stolen
Hundreds of thousands of South Korean children were adopted by families in the United States, Europe and Australia. Now adults, many have since discovered that their adoption paperwork was untrue, and their quest for accountability has spread far beyond South
September 20, 2024
A collage of photos of Korean adoptees.
Interactive: ‘Who Am I, Then?’ Stories from South Korea’s Adoption Reckoning.
Explore this interactive that tells the stories of over a dozen Korean adoptees as they search for the truth about their origins
September 19, 2024
Robert Calabretta holds a photo of himself when he was a baby in his hands.
Article
Adoption Fraud Separated Generations of South Korean Children From Their Families, AP Finds
The stories of South Korean adoptees — who searched for their roots and realized they are not who they were told — have sparked a reckoning that is rocking the international adoption industry
September 19, 2024

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