Emotional Reunions for Korean Relatives Separated Since the War

Numerous divided Koreans are in their 80s and 90s, and understand this is their last chance to see their relatives in the North. A handful of travelers suffer from health problems, and two ambulances escorted those who require medical treatment. “I am 77 years old, and my brother is 83 years old”.

At the same time, the venue for the reunions may reveal something about North Korea’s aspirations. “I want to ask if he can recognize me”.

North Korean hackers stole files from the computers of South Korean lawmakers and hacked into servers at the presidential Blue House, according to Seoul’s spy agency.

“It’s desirable to avoid an expression that North Korea might misunderstand… even though you are curious”, said the guidebook issued before last year’s reunions. Almost half of the 130,410 South Koreans who have applied to attend a reunion have died.

“Father, I am your son”, the 65-year-old Chae Hee-yang from the South said, hugging Chae Hoon-sik, 88.

“It was a bit awkward yesterday as it was the first time”, Nam said. South Korea uses a computerized lottery system to pick participants while the DPRK reportedly chooses based on loyalty to its authoritarian leadership. It was written in the letter he received telling him he’d been chosen for this week’s reunion.

Crying, he told his father: “I’ve always tried to live as a proud son of yours”.

She will likely press Obama to back her Northeast Asia Peace and Cooperation Initiative – a forum that would include North and South Korea, the United States, Japan, China, Russian Federation and Mongolia. “I wondered whether they were taught to say that, although it wasn’t a bad thing to hear”, Park said.

“When we talk about the trilateral relationship, it’s really two bilaterals”, said Karl Friedhoff, public opinion and foreign policy fellow at the The Chicago Council on Global Affairs. “I saw his face, learned that my parents were dead, but that was it”.

They will have 12 hours together before being separated again.

After a brief lunch, they were led into a banquet hall where they first came face-to-face with the relatives who had contacted them for a meeting.

“[The families] meet, embrace one another and just wail because they are so happy to see each other”, he told The Guardian.

“They’ve changed so much”.

North Korea conducted nuclear tests in 2006, 2009 and 2013.

Gifts like alcohol, cosmetics and watches that cost less than $88 are allowed; gold, silver and pearls are banned.

South Korean participants brought thick coats, medicine, underclothes, toothpaste and other basic commodities, thinking those items would be hard to get in the impoverished state under long-standing sanctions over its nuclear and missile development.

The reunions were suspended in 2010 after North Korea fired artillery shells at a South Korean border island, and Pyongyang canceled reunions planned in 2013 at the last minute after claiming Seoul was trying to overthrow North Korea’s government.