Well thought-out regulations

[Update]

This comment may be useful to those wanting to extend an E2 which expires soon (perhaps even two months) after December 15. Last week that person apparently got a renewal 2.5 months early, and avoided the new regulations.

[Original Post]

"New visa rules may force some to return home", according to the Joongang Ilbo. Lovely. Isn't it nice when your visa is up a week after the new regulations come into force? This part is a bit of a head-scratcher:

English teachers are required to leave the country for their annual visa renewal. According to a press release the ministry issued on Friday, people who hold an E-2 visa will still be able to apply for the renewal at Korean consulates in a nearby third country, such as Japan or China.

I'm assuming 'renewal' means 'extension', which means anyone extending their visa gets a free trip to Japan, where they can get fingerprinted and photographed. What fun! Or by 'renewal' do they mean 'getting a new E-2 visa' (which would make more sense)? A free trip to Japan sounds fine to me, though I can't imagine academy owners will be pleased with it. And how making teachers who have committed to another contract leave the country helps keep out all the unqualified, fake-diploma-carrying, HIV carrying, drug-abusing, sex criminal English teachers is beyond me. Perhaps the immigration director got a thicker envelope from a representative of the local airlines than from the hagwon association.

From "bureaucracy's greatest hits", we get this:

Kim Soo-nam, deputy director at the Justice Ministry’s Korean Immigration Service, said the ministry would accept a criminal history report issued by foreign embassies here for the applicant. However, Kim added that so far, none of the embassies here have agreed to provide the service.

Well thanks for offering that option, deputy director Kim! It's nice to see you think foreign governments will pick up the slack when you implement changes too quickly. I'm also glad the following appeared in the Joongang Ilbo:

At least one foreign language school said it welcomes the new rules, as they may help improve the reputation of English teachers, which gets hurt based on just a handful of highly publicized incidents.

Which newspaper broke the story of and "highly publicized" 'English Spectrum-gate' again?