More than 40 percent of the 424,000 people in the country illegally had entered South Korea without obtaining visas and overstayed the allowed period as of the end of 2023, according to data from the Ministry of Justice released Sunday.

The report, submitted to Rep. Song Seog-jun of the People Power Party, said 16.9 percent of the more than 2.5 million foreign nationals in South Korea were in the country illegally.

Of them, 190,000 had entered the country on B-1 and B-2 visas -- these are issued automatically to certain nationalities -- often referred to as “visa exemptions” -- respectively to tourists or people visiting the country while in transit. The overwhelming majority had B-1 status, about 169,000.

By nationality, the largest number of people illegally in the country were Thai with 145,042, making up 76.3 percent of all those overstaying B-1 and B-2 visas. This was followed by 14,830 Chinese nationals and 10,827 Kazakh nationals.

Another 87,000 were on C-3 short-term visit visas.

As for the reasons for illegally staying in South Korea, Song said it was to “engage in economic activities without proper employment visas.”

“As the number of social conflicts is rising due to the rapidly increasing number of illegal immigrants, an efficient response must be taken by the government,” said Song. “However, careful attention must also be taken to ensure no innocent individuals are harmed during the immigration process.”

The Korean government has a history of responding to illegal immigration by suspending visa waiver agreements with countries that show a spike in illegal immigration rates or crime rates that pose harm to society.

In both 2001 and 2008, the government suspended visa waiver programs with Pakistan and Bangladesh, respectively, citing a sharp rise in illegal immigration numbers from those countries.

In July 2019, the government also temporarily suspended the visa waiver agreement with Liberia, citing an increase in crime rates involving crimes such as fraud against Korean nationals.