[아이뉴스24 김정수 기자] Gyeonggi Province will focus on investigating illegal activities such as entry and employment of youth at Hold’em pubs and Hold’em cafes in the province for three weeks from the 24th to December 12.
Hold’em Pub is a combination of ‘Hold’em’, meaning a card game, and ‘Pub’, meaning a bar, and refers to a bar where you can enjoy card games such as poker while drinking.
Although the entry and employment of minors is prohibited in establishments that provide gambling and gambling-encouraging games, such as hold’em pubs and cafes, there are still cases of juveniles entering or being employed in some establishments.
The province plans to investigate △ youth employment practices △ youth entry acts △ lack of measures to restrict youth access in workplaces in order to prevent youths from being exposed to gambling activities and prevent gambling addiction in the period after the Scholastic Ability Test.
According to the current ‘Youth Protection Act’, business owners are subject to criminal punishment if they hire juveniles (imprisonment of up to 3 years or a fine of up to 30 million won), allow juveniles to enter the workplace or enter work places where employment is prohibited, or fail to indicate restrictions on the entry or employment of juveniles (imprisonment of up to 2 years or a fine of up to 20 million won).
Kiido, head of the Special Judicial Police, said, “It is important to protect youth from harmful environments so that they can grow up safely and healthily,” and added, “Gyeonggi Province will act first and prevent youth from being turned into a means of making money or exposed to dangerous temptations.”
Gyeonggi-do receives reports of illegal activities from citizens through its website (www.gg.go.kr/gg_special_cop), Gyeonggi-do call center (031-120), and KakaoTalk channel (Gyeonggi-do Special Judicial Police Unit).
