This file photo, unrelated to this article, shows farmland in Gangwon Province. (Yonhap)
SEOUL, Aug. 12 (Korea Bizwire) — South Korea has so far nationalized 5.04 million square meters of land owned by Japanese citizens and Japanese companies during the 1910-45 colonial rule, the state procurement agency said Thursday.
The official appraisal price of this land is estimated at 150 billion won (US$114 million) and the size of the properties confiscated since 2012 is 1.7 times greater than the area of Yeouido, a financial district in Seoul, according to the Public Procurement Service.
The agency launched a probe on 52,059 plots of land that are suspected to be vested properties and completed the investigation on 91,986 plots of land as of the end of last year.
As a result of the investigation, 6,532 plots of land that were confirmed to be vested properties were nationalized and an additional 974 plots of land are about to be nationalized.
The agency also filed suits to nationalize the ‘hidden properties’ that were privatized through illegal means and succeeded in nationalizing 163 plots of land so far.
In collaboration with the Office for Government Policy Coordination, the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport and municipal governments, the Public Procurement Service is also carrying out a refurbishment project for 100,400 plots of properties registered under Japanese names in official ledgers.
Among them, the agency is conducting an intensive investigation on 33,875 plots of land that are suspected to be vested properties.
It completed the investigation on 18,467 cases as of the end of last month and is on track to nationalize 347 plots that were confirmed to be vested properties.
J. S. Shin (js_shin@koreabizwire.com)
