Korea to inject W2.5tr to reduce rail accidents

South Korea will invest 2.5 trillion won ($2.2 billion) in railway facilities and safety systems to sharply reduce rail accidents this year, the government said Sunday.

The budget allocated to help prevent train crashes and other major rail accidents has been marked up 32 percent, or 610.3 billion won, from last year, the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transportation said in a statement.

Workers engage in removing a derailed passenger train near Yulchon station in the southern port of Yeosu on April 22, 2016. The accident left one engineer dead and eight passengers injured. (Yonhap)

This year, the government aims to achieve "zero cases" of serious rail accidents and reduce cases of derailment or train crashes by 20 percent compared to a year earlier, the statement said. Serious rail accidents refer to cases where there are more than five deaths.

Some of the budget will be spent for the railways' seismic reinforcement to withstand earthquakes and to sustain less damages in case of natural disasters such as torrential rain and falling rocks, it said.  (Yonhap)