Seoul won’t sue Pyongyang over damage to property along border, unification minister says

The government has no plan to seek further legal action against North Korea for damaging South Korean property along the border, Unification Minister Chung Dong-young said Thursday.

The minister was responding to questions during a parliamentary session about whether Seoul would file similar lawsuits, after a court ordered North Korea a day earlier to pay the South Korean government 44.6 billion won ($32.5 million) for demolishing the inter-Korean liaison office in the North Korean border town of Kaesong in 2020.

Chung called the demolition "a wrong thing to do that shocked the South Korean public" and said the ruling confirmed it was illegal and violated inter-Korean agreements.

The minister said, however, the government would not file additional lawsuits "out of practicality."

"It is practically impossible to execute a court ruling against North Korea," he said.

The North blew up the joint liaison office building on June 16, 2020, in protest of Seoul's failure to stop North Korean defectors from sending anti-Pyongyang leaflets across the border.

It also demolished several South Korean-built tourism facilities at the Mount Kumkang resort between 2019 and early 2025.

Yonhap