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| South Koreans on a bus hold the hands of their long-lost family members from North Korea after a reunion event for families separated by the Korean War, at North Korea's Mount Geumgang, in this Oct. 22, 2015, file photo. Despite little progress on inter-Korean relations in recent years, the unification ministry vowed on Tuesday to step up efforts to connect the families with their loved ones in the North. Korea Times file |
Only 30% of reunion applicants still alive; gov't desperate for any means of connection
By Jung Min-ho
Over the past 12 years, more than 24,000 South Koreans have created video letters for their family members who might still be alive in North Korea, hoping that the messages would reach them one day.
In the letters, some of which are available on a website run by the Ministry of Unification, they express hopes of meeting their brothers or sisters lost in the chaos of the 1950-53 Korean War during their childhood. "My mother would probably have died by now after 70 years," a man, 76, who was hoping to find his long-lost younger brother, said in a video clip posted last year.
Despite little progress on inter-Korean relations over the last three years, the ministry said it would not give up. On Tuesday, it vowed to step up efforts to connect people with their loved ones in the North by any means possible, before it is too late.
According to data the ministry presented at a Cabinet meeting that day, more than 10,000 people who had been on the waiting list for family reunions have died within the past three years. Of the 134,000 people on that list, only 42,000, or 31 percent, are still alive. In two years, that is expected to fall below 30 percent, with more than 65 percent of the remaining survivors in their 80s or 90s.
Given that Pyongyang refuses to cooperate on resuming family reunions, the ministry plans to ask the North to exchange information about the separated families first, as many wish to at least know whether their loved ones are still alive.
Ultimately, the objective is to resume family reunions and hold such events as frequently as possible. But given the North's reluctant cooperation since 2018, the ministry is, in the short run, seeking to help them exchange personal letters, pictures and video messages among others. The ministry also plans to expand and improve the facilitation of video chats between family members where the opportunity may arise.
Moreover, the ministry will start carrying out extensive research on such families living overseas. So far, 1,186 overseas Koreans have put their names on the official list of separated families. Officials believe there are many more who are unregistered. They will begin surveying the U.S. and Canada, where many ethnic Koreans live, before deciding whether to expand the study to other countries. The search is expected to help find more facts and draw international publicity for the humanitarian issue, the ministry noted.
Other than the uncooperative North, the ministry views a lack of public attention as one of the biggest hurdles. To renew hope and interest, the ministry said it will intensify its efforts to promote the issue for all generations, especially young people.
Speaking to the media ahead of last year's Chuseok holiday, Unification Minister Kwon Young-se invited North Korea to talk on the issue. But there has been no response.
Since the first Seoul-Pyongyang summit in 2000, the two sides have held 21 rounds of in-person family reunion events, including the latest one in August 2018. Since then, almost all forms of exchanges have been halted amid growing military tensions and the complexities of the pandemic.
