More than two-thousand people who had sought to meet their war-separated family members in North Korea were confirmed to have passed this year alone.

According to the Unification Ministry's register for family reunion applicants on Monday, two-thousand-258 people died from January to late August.

As of late August, there were 133-thousand-530 applicants, of which 35-point-four percent, or 47-thousand-318, were still alive.

Most of the surviving applicants are elderly, with 27-point-six percent in their 90s, and 38-point-five percent in their 80s.

Only one round of inter-Korean family reunions was held under the Moon Jae-in administration, while the conservative Park Geun-hye and Lee Myung-bak administrations saw two each.

There were ten and six rounds under the liberal Roh Moo-hyun and Kim Dae-jung administrations, respectively.