Officers told train more in combat as South Koreans criticise ‘soft’ female police

A recent stabbing has prompted debate on how effective women are at tackling violent crime

SOUTH Korea’s president has ordered officers to undergo extra combat training after a spate of violent crimes reignited the debate over whether an influx of female recruits has led to the police becoming soft.

The police have been accused of dereliction of duty and “bungled responses” that have brought “shame” on the force after a stabbing left a woman in hospital despite two officers being at scene.

One of them was a policewoman who reportedly “ran downstairs screaming”, according to a witness, after an attacker emerged with a knife at a home in Incheon she and a colleague had been called to, despite being armed with a stun gun and baton. “The Police Act stipulates that the top priority is to protect people’s lives and health, as well as to prevent and suppress crimes, but the Incheon incident was a complete retreat (by the officer),” said Oh Yeonghwan, a politician from the ruling Democratic Party, according to Yonhap news agency.

Lee Jun-seok, the head of the conservative People Power Party, has seized on the case, saying gender equality measures may be weakening the force. Hiring practices adopted to boost the number of female recruits should be ended to help ensure that police officers are hired only on merit, said Mr Lee on Monday.

A petition calling for punishment of the police gathered more than 230,000 signatures in three days, passing a threshold needed to trigger a government response.

But President Moon Jae-in has denied that more women in the force is the problem. “This is not about whether it was a male or a female officer, but about the basic attitude of officers at the scene,” said a government official close to the president quoted in The Korea Times. “The president has ordered the strengthening of relevant training and an improvement of systems to prevent a recurrence of such incidents.”

South Korea has been working for several years to raise the number of policewomen to 15 per cent of the 130,000-strong force in 2022. As of December 2020, women made up 13.4 per cent.

But the plans have long been controversial. In 2019, a video of a female officer struggling to contain a violent drunk man went viral, prompting a petition to be posted on the presidential office’s website calling for an end to female recruitment. “We don’t need an officer that requests help from citizens when they are making an arrest,” the petitioner said. “There is a physical difference. Female officers should take the same physical tests as men or be placed in a safer, more comfortable position.”

Persistent criticisms led to the police in June announcing plans to upgrade assessment for fitness when hiring women to match the standards for men.