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| Separated relatives from North and South Korea hold each other's hands during a reunion event on Aug. 25, 2018, the second day of the second round of the 21st inter-Korean family reunion event at a resort on Mount Geumgang in North Korea. Joint Press Corps |
By Jung Da-min
Chuseok, a nationwide autumn holiday, is just around the corner. While many people are expecting to return to their hometowns to spend the holiday with their families, there are those who cannot see their families or visit their hometowns.
The tragedy of separated families since the division of South and North Korea is often forgotten especially when inter-Korean relations are strained.
With North Korea's series of missiles tests since May this year amid the stalled denuclearization talks between Washington and Pyongyang, there is a possibility that this year could be another year that will end without a family reunion event.
Despite the surprise meeting between U.S. President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un on June 30, there has not been much headway with reviving the reunions of separated families. President Moon Jae-in has faced calls from the opposition for regular meetings despite political circumstances. "President Moon should request the North agree to regular meetings of the separated families and exchange of letters," main opposition Liberty Party of Korea (LKP) floor leader Rep. Na Kyung-won said during a speech at the National Assembly on July 4, shortly after the Trump-Kim meeting.
The situation has changed completely since last year, when the latest family reunion event arranged at the governmental level between the two Koreas and held at the end of last August. A year ago around this time, inter-Korean relations were witnessing significant improvements following inter-Korean summits held in April and May. Another one was held in September in Pyongyang.
Expectations were high among the separated families not just in the two Koreas but also abroad including those in the United States who have long-lost relatives left in North Korea.
As the relationship between the U.S. and North Korea was also improving last year with the first summit between the two countries held in June, the separated families in the United States also hoped the U.S. government would arrange family reunion events for them.
But their expectations are turning to disappointment after the U.S. government's decision in August to extend the ban for its citizens traveling to North Korea for another year, amid the stalled denuclearization negotiations following the breakdown of the U.S.-North Korea summit in Hanoi in February.
With the travel ban, Korean Americans who had been traveling to North Korea to visit their family members cannot go to the North anymore.
The main problem with the issue of separated families, for those in the two Koreas and in other countries like the U.S., is that it is often associated with the political situation when it should be handled separately from a humanitarian point of view.
It is a time-pressing issue as the surviving members of separated families are getting older.
Since the South Korean government initiated the family reunion project in 1988, a total of 133,320 people in the South have applied for it as of July 2019.
Among them, less than half or 40 percent (54,126) are still alive and 64 percent (34,633) of those remaining are now older than 80.
The family reunion events arranged at the governmental level between the two Koreas have been held 21 times so far since the first one was held in August 2000, two months after the historic inter-Korean summit between then-President Kim Dae-jung and then-leader of North Korea Kim Jong-il.
Since Kim Jong-un took power in 2011, only three family reunions have been held, in 2014, 2015 and 2018.
No such governmental-level family reunion events have been held between the U.S. and North Korea so far.
