More Pre-Screening of Visitors to Prevent Terror Attacks
Published on | Source
The government and ruling Saenuri Party have agreed to bolster pre-screening of foreign visitors and bar anyone with a dubious record amid growing concerns over airport security here.
Advertisement
The process involves checking the passenger lists of inbound flights before passengers even board their planes.
The Justice Ministry will look out for individuals with prior records of illegal entry, drug possession or smuggling, and other convictions. So far most background checks have been carried out only after passengers arrived in Korea.
The ministry has tested pre-screening of flights from Pudong International Airport in Shanghai and Nagoya International Airport in Japan and three others. It screened 924,000 people intending to board planes there and denied boarding passes to 299 of them.
Now pre-screening is to be extended to nine other airports including Los Angeles, New York and Paris.