The Casualty ID Program thanks the public for their help in the search for soldiers missing in Korea

The Casualty ID Program thanks the public for their help in the search for soldiers missing in Korea

December 5, 2025 - Defence Stories

Estimated read time - 2:00

Members of the Directorate of History and Heritage's (DHH's) Casualty Identification Program are thrilled with the success of a multi-year public campaign, in which relatives of Canadian soldiers missing in Korea were encouraged to register their details with DHH to facilitate a possible DNA match. The program thanks everyone who responded. After four years, DNA donors have been found for 15 of the 16 Canadian missing.

The effort to locate the families was launched after Canada and the Republic of Korea signed a Memorandum of Understanding in June 2021 to expedite efforts to discover and identify Canadian troops who went missing during the 1950-53 Korean Conflict.

Of the more than 26,000 Canadians who deployed to the Republic of Korea between 1950 and 1953, 516 made the ultimate sacrifice, 16 of whom remain missing in action.

Social media posts followed news releases in September 2022, in July 2023, and again this past summer on the Canadian Armed Forces Facebook and X accounts, and each time, they were met with an outpouring of support and suggestions from the public.

Finding the last family is especially complicated, according to Dr. Sarah Lockyer, coordinator of the Casualty Identification Program.

"One of the soldiers was adopted, which has made research into his case particularly challenging," she said. "It's a very real roadblock when information on biological family is difficult to obtain. But even there, we have managed to make some inroads."

Dr. Lockyer recently travelled to the Republic of Korea to attend the Indo-Pacific Regional Dynamic Conference. While she was there, she met with representatives of the Republic of Korea's Ministry of National Defense Agency for Killed in Action Recovery and Identification, known as MAKRI. MAKRI has been working towards locating and recovering the remains of soldiers from the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ), where Canadian soldiers are reported to have gone missing.

"The lab in Korea is continually testing any remains discovered during the excavation of the DMZ," Dr. Lockyer said. "Identification could be completed much faster if the lab had DNA samples on hand."

Should a Canadian be identified, they would be buried at the United Nations Memorial Cemetery in Busan, Republic of Korea.

If you are related to any Canadian missing from the First World War, the Second World War, or the Conflict in Korea, the Casualty Identification Program wants to hear from you.

Family members may be able to provide the key to an identification. To learn more and register your details, please visit the Casualty Identification Program website.