Kim was interrogated, the army launched a particularly aggressive crackdown based on Article 92-6, confiscating soldiers’ cellphones without warrants and forcing them to identify other soldiers with whom they’d had sex, according to the Military Human Rights Center, a civic group based in Seoul, the capital. Most gay soldiers have hidden their sexual orientation for fear of being outed and harassed. Military veterans have long reported discrimination against homosexuals in the army, as well as more widespread abuses like beatings, hazing and bullying.
Ten soldiers were charged in the first half of 2018, the most recent period for which data was available. The number of soldiers charged under it went from two per year in 20 to 14 in 2012, then 28 in 2017. What is forbidden, the army says, is not sexual identity, but what the law calls “indecent” sexual activity.Įnforcement of Article 92-6 has been on the rise. The military says it does not bar gay and transgender people from serving, and the Defense Ministry has expanded training on protecting the rights of sexual minorities. The country’s Constitutional Court has repeatedly ruled that the article is justified by the military’s need to preserve discipline and “combat power.” Rather, it says, it is needed to deter sexual abuse in the army, which is almost entirely male. The South Korean government says Article 92-6 is not meant to punish sexual orientation. “It is long overdue for the military to acknowledge that a person’s sexual orientation is totally irrelevant to their ability to serve,” Ms. The group’s report, “Serving in Silence,” also details sexual and other abuses inflicted on gay soldiers, or soldiers perceived as gay, by their superiors and their fellow soldiers. people as the enemy,” said Roseann Rife, East Asia research director at Amnesty International. “South Korea’s military must stop treating L.G.B.T.I.
and intersex people to abolish the law have been unsuccessful. Repeated attempts by advocates for L.G.B.T. Under Article 92-6, “anal sex and other indecent acts” between military personnel can be punished by up to two years in prison, even if they take place off base, while the soldiers are off duty and by mutual consent.