The majority of financially-stricken North Korean defectors in South Korea are experiencing mental and emotional difficulties.

According to the unification ministry’s survey on some 16-hundred vulnerable North Korean defectors, 47 percent suffered mental and emotional troubles in the latter half of last year. The figure more than doubled from the year before.

Some 25 percent of the respondents picked living expenses as their biggest reason behind their duress, while 22 percent chose education as their biggest problem. 

A North Korean defector who re-defected back to the North earlier this week also reportedly suffered financial woes while living in South Korea.