You Can Submit Your Case To TRC 3 Independently Of Any Other Self Proclaimed “Korean Rights” Group.
TRC 3 = Third Truth and Reconciliation Commission, Republic of Korea.
Posted to Paperslip on January 30th, 2026.
Now that the TRC 3 bill has passed at the S. Korean National Assembly, TRC 3 should formally begin on February 26th, 2026. However, there will be a 2 year submission period for cases of Adoptees (and individuals from other victims’ rights categories).
Please note that you will NOT be able to submit your case to TRC 3 right away on February 26th, 2026 — the Korean Government will need time to set things up. As far as we know, Adoptees should be able to either submit their cases online to TRC 3 through the TRC website, or to submit their cases through a Korean Consulate in your Western home country. We will post as soon as we learn when submissions are open to Adoptees.
It is important to know that for TRC 3, Korean Adoptees can submit their own cases DIRECTLY TO TRC 3, INDEPENDENTLY of any self-proclaimed “Korean Rights” groups, such as DKRG, USKRG, or any of the other *KRG groups. Submitting your case INDEPENDENTLY is considerably safer than going through these Korean Adoptee led organizations, as it eliminates the risk of being blocked or ghosted after sharing sensitive, private adoption documents with groups run by a hodgepodge mix of Korean Adoptees. Most of those in charge of USKRG are not even US Adoptees — they’re mostly Danish, connected to DKRG. Once your documents are submitted to any of the *KRG groups, there will be no way for you to get your documents back, even if these groups block or ghost you (as happened to MANY Korean Adoptees, especially at the hands of DKRG during TRC 2. USKRG was not even formed until well after most Adoptee submissions had already been made to TRC 2 in 2022, and thus did not play much role at all in TRC 2).
We will post more information about the TRC 3 submission process as it becomes available. TRC 3 should be a SIGNIFICANTLY more transparent process for Korean Adoptees, since DKRG is no longer a necessary “Representative” for ALL Korean Adoptees submitting their cases to TRC 3, as they were for TRC 2. This means that anyone blocked or ghosted by DKRG will still be able to obtain information about the TRC 3 process — unlike what happened with TRC 2, where DKRG was the sole “Representative” and mouthpiece of TRC 2. Unfortunately, this “power” really went to DKRG leaders’ heads, who blocked and ghosted MANY Korean Adoptees with active TRC 2 cases from their forums, thus precluding these Adoptees from getting information about the TRC 2 process. Several such Adoptees — including this writer — withdrew our TRC 2 cases as a result, depriving us of obtaining justice for our cases in TRC 2.
It is not up to us to decide how you should proceed regarding submission of your TRC 3 case. Please do what is right for you. We just advise you — especially if you are a U.S. Korean Adoptee — to carefully guard your PRIVACY and protect your sensitive, private adoption documents in these uncertain times.
Please bear in mind that TRC 3 will be obligated to FIRST investigate the 311 cases of Adoptees already submitted under TRC 2. TRC 2 was only able to render judgments in 56 cases of the 367 originally submitted in 3 years of time. This means that like all things related to the search processes of Korean Adoptees, there is going to be a long line for TRC 3 with no guaranteed outcome.