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President Lee Jae Myung presides over a Cabinet meeting held at the presidential office in Seoul on Nov. 11, 2025. (Yonhap)

President Lee Jae Myung ordered Korean government agencies to aggressively crack down on hate speech, instructing the Justice Ministry and relevant government departments to pursue the amendment of the country’s criminal code to that end. 

“Within our society, there is anachronistic discrimination and hatred against certain people of certain races, origin and nationality,” Lee said during a Cabinet meeting at the presidential office in Seoul’s Yongsan District on Tuesday.

“We need to devote all our energy to quickly creating a disciplinary framework to crack down on hate speech and to strictly punish and root out all fake news dissemination at its source,” he added. 

The orders appear as a follow-up to comments Lee made during a Cabinet meeting on Sept. 9, when he addressed the rise of Sinophobic rallies in the country.

“That’s not freedom of speech. That’s just rabble-rousing,” he said at the time, calling for authorities to aggressively respond to rallies and protests that fan hatred. 

After that September meeting, Prime Minister Kim Min-seok ordered police to closely monitor rallies and protests, authorizing them to invoke the Assembly and Demonstration Act and the Act on the Performance of Duties by Police Officers if necessary when responding forcefully. 

Tuesday’s Cabinet meeting also involved discussions of legislation designed to prevent hate speech. 

Justice Minister Jung Sung-ho proposed amending the Assembly and Demonstration Act as the quickest and most effective way to curb the hate speech and obscenities proliferating at rallies. 

Lee suggested that the relevant authorities “act quickly” and refer to legislative precedents from Germany and other countries in regard to amendments to assembly regulations and the criminal code. 

“If we do amend the Criminal Act, we should take the opportunity to review abolishing the crime of defamation by factual statement. If defamation does occur through factual statements, it should be a civil case. It shouldn’t be a criminal offense,” the president said. 

Tschoe Dong-seok, the minister of personnel management, said that, regardless of criminal punishment, he would “hold civil servants who use hate speech sternly accountable, depending on the severity of their statements.” 

“That seems absolutely necessary. Get on it right away,” Lee responded. 

“Recently, the head of one institution made comments about ‘white faces’ and ‘dark faces,’ which is unacceptable,” Lee said, referring to Korean Red Cross chief Kim Chul-soo, who has expressed intentions to resign amid controversy over previous racist remarks. 

Civic groups applauded Lee’s efforts to root out hate speech, but say that it’s impossible to solve the issue without enacting a broader anti-discrimination law first. 

“There are movements to enact legislation that would ban hate speech, but I don’t understand why legislators are pushing the band-aid of hate speech laws when the fundamental measure of an anti-discrimination law is already on the table,” said Park Dong-chan, the head of the Third Voice Institute, which has led counterprotests to anti-China rallies occurring in Seoul’s Daerim neighborhood. 

An activist known as Mong, who is co-chair of the Coalition for Anti-discrimination Legislation, said, “Before enacting legislation that specifically deals with hate speech, we need to lay the groundwork with an anti-discrimination law.” 

“Anti-hate speech laws won’t do anything without an anti-discrimination law,” they said. 

By Shin Hyeong-cheol, staff reporter

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