South and North Korea had no cross-border trade last year and Seoul's humanitarian aid to Pyongyang hit an all-time low amid frozen inter-Korean ties, the unification ministry said Friday. It marked the first time that the two Koreas logged no cross-border trade since 1989, when they began trading, according to the 2024 Unification White Paper issued by the ministry. The cumulative value of inter-Korean transactions reached US$24.86 billion between 1989 and 2022. Cross-border trade between the two Koreas covers commercial transactions and shipments of humanitarian aid. Even in 2020-2022 at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, there was inter-Korean trade due to civic groups' shipments of quarantine supplies to the North. The data reflects frosty relations between the Koreas that have been aggravated in recent years amid Pyongyang's continued weapons tests. This file photo, taken May 10, 2023, shows a road in Paju, just north of Seoul, that leads to the now-shuttered joint industrial complex in North Kor ea's border city of Kaesong. (Yonhap) South Korea's nutrition aid for North Korean children and other humanitarian assistance to North Korea amounted to 900 million won ($653,000) last year, down from 2.6 billion won the previous year. The 2023 figure marked the smallest amount since 1995, when the ministry began compiling related data. Of them, civic groups provided aid worth 700 million won. No humanitarian assistance was offered to the North via international organizations for the third straight year last year. The ministry also said the two Koreas saw no exchange of personnel for the third straight year in 2023. No South Koreans have visited North Korea since January 2020, when South Korea withdrew officials from the now-demolished joint liaison office in the North Korean border city of Kaesong as the North made such a demand, citing concerns about COVID-19. Source: Yonhap News Agency
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