Environmental groups urge halt to Seoraksan cable car, warn of heritage site damage

Environmental groups held a press conference in Busan on Sunday, calling for a halt to development projects near World Heritage sites, including the Osaek cable car project on Seoraksan.

The Korea Environment Council and other environmental organizations gathered near BEXCO in Busan, where the opening ceremony of the World Heritage Committee was being held, and criticized the government for being eager to secure new World Heritage listings while neglecting preservation and management after inscription.

"South Korea has 15 World Cultural Heritage sites and two World Natural Heritage sites, but has repeatedly failed at conservation and management," the groups said, urging the government to halt development projects that undermine the value of World Heritage designations.

On the Osaek cable car project on Seoraksan, the groups said the core section of the planned route falls within a specially protected zone of a national park where even human access is restricted. Erecting steel towers there, they said, would violate the principles of natural heritage conservation.

The groups also cited the construction of a new airport at Saemangeum and plans to relocate Gwangju Airport to the Muan tidal flat area as examples of development pressure threatening the expanded inscription of Korea's tidal flats, and called for both projects to be scrapped.

They further urged the government to draw up a concrete plan for nominating the Nakdong River estuary as a World Natural Heritage site, and called for the cancellation of housing supply plans near Taereung and Gimpo Jangneung, the halt of the Sewun Zone 4 redevelopment project in front of Jongmyo Shrine, and stronger management of World Heritage buffer zones.

Before the press conference, the groups marched through the area around BEXCO and staged a performance warning of environmental damage caused by development projects.