TESTING AT DETENTION CENTER

[Anchor Lead]

A sixth round of Covid-19 testing has been conducted at the Dongbu Detention Center, where more than a thousand people have been infected. The justice ministry has come under fire for critics describe as its poor initial response to the outbreak.

[Pkg]

The Dongbu Detention Center in Seoul has conducted its sixth round of testing on some 1300 inmates and officers. The outbreak at the facility continues to snowball. On Monday, six more cases were confirmed. Six out of seven inmates whose results had been postponed in the previous testing eventually tested positive. One of the inmates who was released on December 26 was confirmed to have the coronavirus at an external screening facility. So far, the total case count has reached 1047. On Monday, the justice ministry had the inmates transported to another detention center to reduce crowdedness. Defendants at the Dongbu Detention Center are being urged to apply for bails. It's been more than a month since the outbreak at the prison began, but the ministry and health authorities have yet to find out the exact cause of the spread.

[Soundbite] PARK YOO-MI(SEOUL METROPOLITAN GOV'T) : "The transmission was presumably caused by crowded cells and poor ventilation. We are conducting additional investigations."

It's been found belatedly that the ministry dismissed an inmate's request to let him purchase protective masks at his own expense back in September, when mask wearing was strongly urged. The ministry says it declined the request because the inmate cited not only COVID-19 but also dust pollution. It explained that inmates are only allowed to purchase masks when they have a medical diagnosis. The Lawyers for a Democratic Society blasted the ministry for failing to take more effective measures to block infections at the detention center, demanding that it disclose its plan to tackle the outbreak. Meanwhile, an officer has tested positive at the Jeju Correctional Institution. The ministry says the case is unrelated to the Dongbu Detention Center.