West is accused of turning South Korea into an adoption factory

Western governments have for decades readily approved and even promoted the adoption of South Korean children despite evidence that adoption agencies competed aggressively for children, pressured mothers and bribed hospitals, an Associated Press-led investigation found. Many of those children, now adults, have since discovered that their adoption records were untruthful. Their quest for accountability has spread far beyond Korea's borders to the Western countries that took them in, roiling international adoption.

• The AP, in cooperation with PBS' Frontlinespoke to more than 80 adoptees in the United States, Australia and Europe and examined thousands of pages of documents to find evidence of abducted or missing children ending up overseas, names being made up, babies being switched, and parents being told their newborns were seriously ill or dead, only to discover decades later that they had been sent to new parents overseas.