Seoul Mayor Park Won-soon has been enthusiastic about making the capital city more attractive ― and fairer ― to foreign visitors. Last year, he disguised himself as a Japanese traveler, then took a taxi and came by shops in popular tourist areas to check on the practice of overcharging foreigners. What he experienced at that time led the city government to work out a scheme for compensating foreign tourists for the amount by which they were ripped off.

In a further reflection of his will to turn Seoul into a more secure and comfortable place for travelers from around the world, the city is planning to introduce a tourist police system. Consultations on preparatory work have been underway with the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism and the National Police Agency.

The measure appears necessary for coping with a growing number of complaints raised by foreign tourists, whose number exceeded 11 million last year. According to the Korea Tourism Organization, the number of complaints from foreigners traveling here jumped from 468 in 2009 to 897 in 2012.

Benchmarking the systems operated by Malaysia and Thailand, the planned tourist police would be more instrumental in handling crimes against foreign tourists and accidents involving them, eliminating overcharging and providing information and emergency medical services.

In the initial stage, a dozen officers are to be deployed in each of three selected districts frequented by foreign tourists ― Myeong-dong, Jongno and Dongdaemun. According to city officials, two options are being considered on the method of operation for the tourist police. One is to assign officers fluent in foreign languages at police stations in tourist areas. The other is to set up separate tourist police stations, which might better serve foreign tourists’ needs.

Other metropolitan and provincial governments may also find it useful to run their own tourist police squads. Qualified tourist police officers may be recruited as part of the government’s plan to increase police manpower by 20,000 over the next five years as one of President Park Geun-hye’s election pledges.

Seoul City officials hope the introduction of tourist police will help attract more foreign tourists and improve their perception of the city and the country as a whole. It may be so, but the measure should also serve as a reminder that Korea has not done enough to make foreign visitors feel more secure, convenient and comfortable during their stay here. This effort is all the more necessary at a time when the country has suffered a widening deficit in tourism in recent months as outbound travelers have outnumbered inbound visitors. All Korean citizens, not to mention taxi drivers and shop owners, should be ready to treat foreign visitors the way they would want to be treated as a traveler abroad.