Woo Won-sik, “We need to increase the number of people in charge of major historical sites in the country.”

Woo Won-sik, “We need to increase the number of people in charge of major historical sites in the country.”

(Seoul = Yonhap News) Reporter Ahn Jung-hoon = There are more than 1,000 overseas independence movement historical sites around the world, but it turns out that there is only one veterans affairs officer in charge of managing them.

According to data submitted on the 23rd by Rep. Woo Won-sik of the Democratic Party of Korea, a member of the National Assembly Foreign Affairs and Unification Committee, from the Ministry of Patriots and Veterans Affairs, there are 1,032 historical sites of the overseas independence movement distributed in 24 countries around the world.

China had the most with 483, followed by the United States (159), Russia (123), and Japan (69).

The problem is that there is only one veterans affairs officer at an overseas embassy who is in charge of managing these overseas independence movement historical sites, and he is currently dispatched to the embassy in the United States.

In the case of China, where 46.8% of all historical sites are concentrated, the veterans affairs officer dispatched to the Consulate in Shanghai withdrew without follow-up measures after the dispatch ended in October 2022, leaving the site vacant since 2023.

Accordingly, it is argued that the number of veterans affairs officers should be increased and a systematic veterans diplomacy infrastructure should be established, focusing on embassies where major historical sites are concentrated.

Rep. Woo said, “About 1,000 historic sites around the world may be at risk of disappearing due to local development, etc.,” and suggested, “We need to increase the number of veterans officers, focusing on countries with major historic sites, and establish an active veterans diplomacy system.”