The South Korean government said Friday it had launched a probe into the safety of 19 children who have not been registered for school this year with their whereabouts unknown.

Since earlier this year, the government has surveyed the enrollment status of schoolchildren who were supposed to enter elementary and middle schools this year nationwide, as part of its fortified measures against child abuse. A survey of long-term absentee students is separately underway.

Of nearly 7,600 children who were found to not have enrolled in elementary and middle schools in time, some 5,400 of them were found to have moved abroad. Others were found to have enrolled in international schools or could not enter school due to illness, among other reasons.

Elementary and middle school education is compulsory in Korea.

The ministry then sent a list of 286 children whose whereabouts they could not immediately confirm to police. One of them was Shin Young-won, a 7-year-old who was found dead last month from starvation and abuse at the hands of his stepmother.

The government and police were able to identify the safety of most of the children, but 19 remain missing. The ministry said most of them were multicultural children with dual citizenship.

“In case of multicultural children with dual citizenship, confirming the whereabouts is difficult if they have left the country. There have been no signs of child abuse so far among those cases,” said a ministry official.

The ministry has been releasing measures to prevent and crack down on child abuse, such as expanding monitoring of preschool operations and establishing child abuse report manuals for kindergarten and child care centers. It has also mandated schools report if a student is absent for unknown reasons for more than two consecutive days. Previously, the report was required upon absences of three consecutive days.

The measures follow a series of brutal child abuse cases revealed this year that have led to the deaths of the children.

Most recently on Friday, police referred a 22-year-old father in Bucheon, Gyeonggi Province, to prosecutors, requesting charges of murder resulting from the abuse of his 3-month-old daughter who would not stopping crying on March 9.

Park is suspected of deliberately dropping the baby twice on the floor and leaving her to die. The police suspected that Park engaged in willful negligence, considering he did not provide proper medical care for the baby. His 22-year-old wife was charged with habitually neglecting the child, police said.

By Lee Hyun-jeong (rene@heraldcorp.com)