Lee vows to prevent industrial deaths with all available means

▲ This photo shows President Lee Jae Myung at Cheong Wa Dae in Seoul on April 27, 2026. (Yonhap)

Lee-workplace disasters

Lee vows to prevent industrial deaths with all available means

SEOUL, April 28 (Yonhap) -- President Lee Jae Myung on Tuesday pledged to mobilize all available resources to prevent workplace deaths, marking a state-designated day for commemorating industrial disaster victims.

Lee called eliminating industrial disasters and achieving safety-based sustainable growth a "key task" and a core priority of his government on his Facebook account on Industrial Accident Workers' Day.

South Korea designated the day in 2024 to coincide with International Workers' Memorial Day on April 28, in remembrance and mourning of those who died on duty.

"(The government) will mobilize all possible means so that workplaces will no longer be sites of death," Lee wrote.

"We still have a long way to go in the face of the heart-rending outcries of those who lost family members and neighbors" to industrial disasters, the president also said, pledging necessary legal and institutional upgrades to prevent workplace deaths.

He said signs of positive change had emerged, noting that the number of industrial deaths fell 17.5 percent in the first quarter of this year from a year earlier, "thanks to multifaceted government efforts and labor-management cooperation."

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