South Korea’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission has found the country’s past military governments responsible for atrocities committed at Brothers Home, a state-funded vagrants’ facility where thousands were enslaved and abused from the 1960s to 1980s.

By KIM TONG-HYUNG, Associated Press

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — South Korea’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission has found the country’s past military governments responsible for atrocities committed at Brothers Home, a state-funded vagrants’ facility where thousands were enslaved and abused from the 1960s to 1980s.

The landmark report on Wednesday came 35 years after a prosecutor first exposed the horrors at the facility in the southern port city of Busan and details an attempted cover-up of incriminating evidence that would have confirmed a state-sponsored crime.

The commission’s chairperson, Jung Geun-sik, urged South Korea’s current government to issue a formal apology to survivors and explore ways to ease their suffering as he announced the initial results of its investigation into Brothers, including extreme cases of forced labor, violence and deaths.

The commission also called for the government to review the conditions at current welfare facilities around the country and swiftly ratify the U.N. convention against enforced disappearances.

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