Hyundai Motor to help Vietnamese divorcees

Vietnamese women that were married to Korean men and their children, Hyundai Motor officials and other volunteer workers pose at the opening ceremony of the Han-Viet Multicultural Center in Can Tho, Vietnam on Thursday. [HYUNDAI MOTOR]

Hyundai Motor has set up a multicultural center in the city of Can Tho in Vietnam to give a helping hand to Vietnamese women and their children who return to their homeland after a failed marriage in Korea.

With the new center, labeled the Han-Viet Multicultural Center, Hyundai Motor will use 1 billion won ($940,000) over the next two years to support the center’s voluntary activities aimed at divorced Vietnamese women and their children.

Twenty percent of Vietnamese women who marry Korean men in Korea are from the city, according to the company.

The Han-Viet Multicultural Center, the first center of its kind in the city, will provide free legal services and education aimed at helping divorced women to be financially independent.

The center will also run a children’s library and educational programs for children.

“Vietnamese women who get divorced in Korea return to their homeland because they cannot legally stay in Korea any longer. But since they don’t know about the legal process of a divorce, lack financial independence and sometimes fall victim to violence, we suspect that a lot of divorced Vietnamese women and their children are returning to their homeland without following the proper process,” said the company in a statement.

Since 2016, Hyundai Motor has offered a range of services in collaboration with the Korea Center for the United Nations Human Rights Policy (Kocun) in Can Tho, such as educating Vietnamese women who will soon move to Korea, providing legal advice and Korean language classes.

According to a Kocun survey, 25 percent of foreign women that married Korean men between 2000 and 2016 were from Vietnam. During the same period, one out of five marriages with a Vietnamese bride went through a divorce. A majority of these women have suffered from poverty and social stigma since returning to Vietnam.

BY JIN EUN-SOO [jin.eunsoo@joongang.co.kr]