March 30, 2026
SEOUL – For decades, an abandoned building with barred windows and faded walls in Dongducheon, Gyeonggi Province, has stood as a reminder of a system few speak about openly.
Now, as the city moves to demolish what is believed to be South Korea’s last remaining sexually transmitted disease detention center relic, a long-simmering conflict over whether to erase or confront one of the country’s most painful legacies is resurfacing.
Survivors, activists and officials are locked in a renewed dispute as time runs out both for those who lived through the system and the physical evidence that remains.
“On the first day I was taken there, I just cried, as I was not used to being there,” a woman surnamed Kim told The Korea Herald.
Now in her 60s, Kim paused as she recalled the experience, describing how she was abruptly taken to the facility in the 1970s and separated from her child without warning.
“I could not sleep, worrying about my child at home,” she said. “The other women (detained at the center) comforted me and tried to calm me down.”
She said she had been stopped near the US military base Camp Casey despite being married to an American serviceman, and was detained simply for not carrying identification. That moment marked the beginning of what she described as days of fear, pain and confinement.
Without undergoing an STD test, she was given an unusually large injection of penicillin, which caused excruciating pain. She was then held behind bars for a week in an unsanitary environment, with poor conditions and inadequate food.
Kim recalled it as a prison for camptown women who had contact with US military personnel, as well as others who were rounded up indiscriminately, like herself.
Her account reflects a broader pattern described by survivors, who say the centers operated less as medical facilities than as sites of detention and control.
A woman surnamed Kim speaks about her experience at an STD management center in Dongducheon, Gyeonggi Province, during an interview with The Korea Herald on March 22. PHOTO: THE KOREA HERALD
The Dongducheon facility is the only known remaining center linked to a nationwide system that, from the 1970s to the 1990s, confined and treated sex workers near US military bases under state oversight.
Dongducheon, long a key US military hub with bases such as Camp Hovey, as well as former installations including Camp Castle and Camp Nimble, developed camptown commercial districts that grew alongside the long-term presence of US troops after the Korean War.
What began as a public health measure to treat sexually transmitted diseases evolved into a system of surveillance, detention and forced treatment — according to testimonies and civic groups — one that critics say reflected broader state efforts to manage camptown economies tied to the US military presence.
The Korean government operated more than 40 such facilities across the country.
Authorities actively sought out women around US camptowns who avoided STD tests or failed routine checkups, as well as those identified by US personnel as possibly having infections. Checkups conducted by public health centers were carried out regularly, in some cases as often as twice a week.
The women were then sent to STD detention centers, where they were typically confined for about a week, but the period was extended if they did not test negative.
At the centers, women were forcibly injected with benzathine penicillin and subjected to indoctrination sessions that framed their role as contributing to the national interest.
The treatment, allegedly administered in high doses without consent or allergy testing, has been linked to reports of abnormal symptoms, with some testimonies describing deaths from suspected anaphylactic shock.
Kim also recalled an incident involving another woman at the Dongducheon center, saying she saw a woman slam her face against the bed frame, leaving her face and neck deeply red.
Testimonies from camptown women indicate that many of them were drawn into the area by poverty or, in some cases, abduction, but had no choice but to remain, trapped by debt and physical abuse.
The barred windows on the building’s second floor, which prevented women from escaping, are cited by preservationists as physical evidence of how confinement was enforced.
Decadeslong efforts to shed light on the victims’ suffering are only recently bearing fruit. Following a 2022 ruling by the Supreme Court of Korea that granted compensation, the gender equality minister issued the first official state apology on March 7.
The victims now seek to hold the US accountable through a lawsuit filed last year.
A coalition of civic groups said US military vehicles and facilities were used in the system, citing testimony from a plaintiff, while also alleging negligence toward abuse and crimes committed by military personnel.
The legal efforts mark a shift from silence toward accountability, but progress has been slow and uneven.
Activists warn that time is running out as victims age. Of the 122 plaintiffs who filed suit in 2014, 24 did not live to see the 2022 ruling, and others have hesitated to come forward due to stigma and trauma.
Few physical traces of Korea’s STD centers remain, and the last remaining building in Dongducheon now faces demolition.
The site has become a focal point of the dispute between those calling for its erasure and those who wish to preserve it. Civic groups, President Lee Jae Myung and the United Nations Human Rights Council call for the latter, but the city government pushes ahead with redevelopment, citing strong local support for demolition and long-standing stigma associated with camptowns.
“The site is a scar of the past that has long been neglected, and a memory many residents want to erase,” a city official wrote. “Many Dongducheon residents have concealed where they live to avoid the negative image associated with camptowns.”
Despite preservation calls, the city has maintained its position.
“We began discussions (with the Ministry of Gender Equality and Family, Gyeonggi Province, the Korea Heritage Service and civic groups) on March 13 … but our position on demolition remains unchanged,” another city official told The Korea Herald.
Sex work generated significant income for Korea at a time when the country was in urgent need of dollars. Earnings from camptowns, including those from the sex trade, were estimated to be equivalent to nearly 20 percent of the country’s export earnings in 1970.
This economic role, often framed at the time as a form of national contribution, has since deepened the stigma surrounding the women, many of whom were later left without support. Decades of exploitation also left many of the women in poverty, without family support.
With a sit-in protest near the building nearing its 600th day, preservationists call for the site to be transformed into a museum dedicated to peace and women’s rights, highlighting how war and military tensions affect the lives of people living near bases.
They say the city could turn its history of coexisting with one of the largest US military base areas in Korea into a global tourism asset, at a time when conflicts and violence continue around the world.
“The government promoted the women as dollar earners, but how could it ignore this history?” said Kim. “I will not step back. This is a place filled with our unresolved grief.”
As negotiations resume after years of stalemate, activists say the fate of the building will not only determine the future of the site but also whether the memories of the women who passed through are preserved or quietly erased.