South Korea has provided humanitarian aid to North Korea every year since 1995, but this long-standing record was broken in 2024. South Korea's Unification Ministry confirmed on Wednesday (March 3) that neither the government nor civil society groups provided any humanitarian aid to North Korea last year.
According to a report and analysis by Yonhap News Agency, the reason why South Korea interrupted its humanitarian aid last year was that it was unilaterally rejected by North Korea. After the Yoon Seok-yeol government called for the principle of "orderly inter-Korean exchanges", civil contacts between North and South Korea were completely cut off, which was also a key factor in the sharp decline in humanitarian aid.
Looking back at South Korea's humanitarian aid operations, the scale of aid reached its peak in 2007, with a total of 4397 billion won (equivalent to 3 million US dollars) in resources provided, but it has since decreased as the Pyongyang authorities accelerated their nuclear weapons development.
In 2018, the South Korean government provided North Korea with drugs for the prevention and control of tree diseases and insect pests, and then tried to promote a food aid program of 2020 billion won (equivalent to 118 million US dollars) through the World Food Program (WFP) in 810, but failed due to North Korea's refusal. Since then, there has been no attempt to provide assistance through international organizations.
As of 2023, South Korean civil groups provided 9 million won (equivalent to 62 US dollars) in aid to North Korean child nutrition agencies, making it the only recent humanitarian aid operation to North Korea.
