Writings written by separated households and guests are displayed on the 2nd Separated Households Day commemorative exhibition on the Seoul Museum of Historical past in Jongno-gu, Seoul, on Thursday. (Yonhap)
Almost 2,000 separated members of the family in South Korea died within the first eight months of this yr with out having a chance to reunite with their family members in North Korea after being separated by the 1950-53 Korean Warfare, authorities knowledge confirmed Sunday.
A complete of 1,961 candidates for government-arranged reunions for separated households died within the January-August interval, elevating the full variety of such folks to 96,352, based on the info from the unification ministry.
As of end-August, round 134,160 folks had registered with the unification ministry for household reunion occasions.
The variety of surviving folks got here to 37,806 as of the tip of final month, with 66.5 p.c of the full aged 80 or older, based on the info.
Separated households in South Korea have had no exchanges with their relations in North Korea both at authorities or civilian ranges for greater than a yr amid frosty inter-Korean ties.
Because the first inter-Korean summit in 2000, the 2 Koreas have held 21 rounds of separated household reunions. Because the final occasion in August 2018, state-arranged household occasions have been suspended.
The federal government plans to carry a ceremony to mark the second Separated Households Day later within the day in a bid to assist solace divided households’ ache, the ministry stated.
Final yr, South Korea designated Aug. 13 on the lunar calendar as a commemorative day for separated households by reflecting their want to reunite with members of the family within the North across the Chuseok fall harvest vacation. Chuseok, which falls on Aug. 15 on the lunar calendar, is likely one of the nation’s two largest conventional holidays.
