Divided families prematurely end reunions due to worsening health

Kim Seom-gyeong, 91, and Hong Shin-ja, 84, reunited with their families from North Korea for the first time in 60 years by visiting the North by ambulances with the determination that they ‘would rather die on Mount Kumgang’ on Thursday. But they ended up returning prematurely to South Korea by the ambulance on Friday, while the family reunion event is still underway on the scenic mountain in the North.

In the wake of medics’ judgment that it would be too much of challenge for the two to continue participating in the reunion event due to severe deterioration of their health, they had no choice but to give up one day before the event’s end. They only met their loved ones from the North for four hours, including two hours of individual reunions on Thursday, and two hours of collective reunions on Wednesday.

Jin-Hwang, Kim’s son who took him to Mount Kumgang to meet with Kim’s daughter Chun-soon, 68, and Jin-cheon, 65, from the North said, “I told him that we were moving briefly, because I feared that he would be shocked, and could not tell him that the individual reunion would be the last session of the reunion event for my father,” which caused people around them to feel all the more sorry. Hong, who met with her younger sister, Yeong-ok, 82, from the North said, “I want to take my sister with me.” Lee Gyeong-hee, Hong’s daughter, said, “It was a miraculous reunion.”

Paradoxically, Lee’s comments suggest that it is great ‘luck’ to be (randomly) selected to take a reunion opportunity, and indicate that the current method of one-off reunions should no longer continue. Using the current method to select families who would gain reunion opportunities through draws, only 11,882 people (16.6 percent) of 71,503 surviving separated families met with their families from the North over the past 14 years since 2000. This is only about one fifth of 58,258 separated families aged 70 or older.