Court orders Korea to pay injured U.S. base worker

A Seoul court ruled Monday that the South Korean government should compensate a Korean citizen paralyzed from the waist down in an industrial accident while working at the U.S. military base.

The Seoul Central District Court ruled in favor of the man, whose name remained unidentified, ordering the government to pay 360 million won ($305,000) in compensation. 

The man, who has worked for the U.S. troops in Gyeonggi Province since 1994, filed a compensation suit after he suffered injuries to his neck and waist when goods rolled down from a truck in 2010. The injury left him paralyzed from the waist down. 

“The supervisor at the workplace should have been aware of the danger that the truck could damage a person,” the court said, citing the Korean supervisor‘s “negligence of duty.”

But the South Korean government should compensate the victim on behalf of the boss, hired by the U.S. military, in accordance with the Status of Forces Agreement signed between South Korea and the U.S. in 1966, it said.

The court also acknowledged the victim’s negligence, too, saying that the government doesn‘t have to fully compensate the victim. The authorities were ordered to pay 75 percent of the money the man initially claimed.
The verdict is the latest addition to a series of rulings that held the South Korean government accountable for the misdeeds or violations of domestic law by U.S. soldiers. 

Earlier in July, the court ruled that the government should compensate a Korean citizen injured in a traffic accident caused by a U.S. corporal driving a five-ton army truck in Suwon in 2011.

SOFA stipulates that South Korea is responsible for compensating third parties who suffer damages caused by U.S troops stationed here.
Around 28,500 U.S. soldiers are stationed in South Korea, where the U.S. military has maintained a large presence to deter North Korean aggression since the 1950-53 Korean War. 

The war ended in an armistice, not a peace treaty, leaving the two Koreas technically still at war. 

By Ock Hyun-ju (laeticia.ock@heraldcorp.com)