investigations into several social issues, such as a civilian inspection of the Prime Minister’s Office, the response of the 112 telephone reporting center to murder cases involving woman, chronic sexual assault and harsh acts in the military, and the excessive use of equipment by the police. The investigations culminated in improvement recommendations. Moreover, the Commission carried out onsite investigations into local holding cells and local convoy police stations, foreigner care facilities, and protective facilities for the youth, and actively responded to human rights violations committed by national investigative agencies and governmental authorities during the process of execution of penalties and arrest warrants, focusing on preventive remedial actions. The NHRCK operates exclusive counseling windows for the sake of receiving complaints and counseling with professional human rights counselors and expert advisers. In this way, the Commission has tried to improve the quality of its counseling service and enhance accessibility to the Commission. In 2012, the Commission replaced its pre-existing phone call counseling system with a new system that can support the functions of recording, callback and statistics management, and launched an appointment system, counseling in English for foreigners and in sign language for people with hearing impairment. These attest to the Commission’s efforts to improve the quality of human rights counseling service. A total of 7 customized onsite counseling sessions were held around the country, in which the NHRCK visits the socially vulnerable (North Korean defectors, people with disabilities, refugees, migrant workers, senior citizens and youth), with the goal of improving accessibility to the Commission’s counseling service. The Commission has continuously studied whether complaint boxes have been installed in correctional/ institutional group care facilities which are a known blind spot in human rights protection so that the right to file complaints of people being held in custody is protected. Thanks to such efforts, the Commission resolved a total of 69,790 complaints in 2012, including 9,581 complaints, 29,267 counseling sessions, and 30,942 civil applications and inquiries. 86 Part II. Major Activities of the Commission