Chinese villains? Seoul Metro apologizes for 'racist' comments

The state-run operator of Seoul's subway system on Monday issued an apology related to its recent comment on an online petition, in which it used the word "villain" to refer to Chinese people.

Seoul Metro recently used what have been widely called racist remarks in the official reply to a complaint posted on the Civil Complaint/Proposal Integrated Services (Eungdapso Seoul) webpage of the Seoul Metropolitan Government.

"We apologize for the inappropriate language related to the Chinese tourists in responding to the complaint," Seoul Metro said. "We will conduct a special training for all employees, including the ones in the department replying to the complaints, to prevent similar cases. We will also ensure that the head of the department replies to such complaints, or at least check the content of the responses."

The complaint in question was posted on Oct. 26, and had raised an issue about the supposed "excessive amount of Chinese announcements at subways and ancient palaces."

In the response, Seoul Metro said "when more two or more Chinese gather there are frequently 'villians' who get noisy and make a ruckus."

The response is accessible to anyone who visits the Eungdapso Seoul homepage.

The aforementioned contentious response also said that the Seoul Metro will review making the announcement only in Korean and English, about which the state-run company said "no such review has been made about the matter."