Children walk through Seoul National Cemetery in Dongjak District in this June 24 file photo. Korea Times photo by Nam Dong-gyun
The government will try to identify all unclaimed fallen soldiers buried at national cemeteries and bestow state honors on them, officials said Thursday.
The Anti-Corruption and Civil Rights Commission and the Ministry of Patriots and Veterans Affairs said they will look into military conscription records and all other available data to check the identities of all those fallen heroes and honor them as national meritorious service personnel.
The rights commission has been in discussions on the matter with the patriots ministry after confirming in August last year that an Army major buried at a national cemetery had not been registered as a state-honored hero because he had no family members to file for the recognition.
The project will begin with those buried at the Seoul National Cemetery and expand to the Daejeon National Cemetery and 19 other state-managed cemeteries, the rights commission said.
Hundreds of thousands of South Koreans were killed during the 1950-53 Korean War.
It is unclear how many sets of remains buried at national cemeteries have not been claimed.
Source: Korea Times News
