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JoongAngDaily reports that South Korea has eased the path to citizenship and relaxed immigration restrictions as follows:

• seventeen additional citizenship examination centers are opening in local immigration offices this month (previously, there was only one venue for taking citizenship examinations);
• companies can submit visa applications online (www.visa.go.kr) instead of sending company officials to apply on-site at immigration offices;
• procedures for obtaining re-entry permits following short home visits and overseas trips will be eased for international students and foreign nationals married to South Korean nationals;
• applicants who file re-entry applications on-site or through the Immigration Service’s official website will be permitted to make unlimited overseas trips and re-enter on multiple occasions regardless of their length of residence in South Korea; and
• individuals applying for re-entry will be exempt from paying fees.

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Current global migration patterns indicate that, due to rising unemployment rates and contracting economies in developed countries, fewer workers are migrating from poor to wealthier nations, and the flow of migrant workers returning to their home countries is increasing. As reported in The Wall Street Journal,  this is potentially the biggest reversal in migration flows since the Great Depression.

Statistics illustrating the reversal include:

• Emigration from Mexico to the U.S. dropped 13% in the first quarter of 2009 compared to the first quarter of 2008. In the same period, more people returned to Mexico than left Mexico for the U.S., about 139,000 and 137,000, respectively.
• In 2009, a projected 60,000 or more Indonesia citizens will return home from Malaysia, South Korea and other wealthy neighboring nations, as immigrant workers lose their jobs.
• Tens of thousands of Indians are returning from Dubai as jobs there dwindle and work permits expire.
• In the United Kingdom, the number of registered workers coming from new European Union member nations like Poland and the Czech Republic dropped 55% in the first quarter of 2009 compared to the same quarter a year earlier.

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