Seoul, Jun 23 (IANS): Nearly 170 employees of banks and other financial firms embezzled around 180 billion won combined ($122.21 million) over the past six years in South Korea, but less than 10 per cent has been retrieved, data showed on Sunday.

According to the data from the Financial Supervisory Service (FSS), a total of 168 officials from the country's financial firms pocketed 178.92 billion won combined from 2018-2023.

The amount of stolen money came to 5.67 billion won in 2018 but surged to 15.69 billion won in 2021 and 82.76 billion won in 2022 before falling slightly to 64.26 billion won last year, reports Yonhap news agency.

But a mere 9.8 per cent, or 17.45 billion won of the total, has been redeemed, indicating that their embezzlement has caused damage to corporate profits and ultimately to customers.

In 2022, the FSS announced a set of measures to strengthen internal control, but critics have said that they are far from enough to prevent such cases.

This year alone, 11 officials have been caught for pocketing 1.51 billion won combined, and 6.7 per cent of the amount has been retrieved, the data showed.

There have been renewed calls for stronger rules and supervision after a Woori Bank employee in his 30s was arrested earlier this month on charges of embezzling around 10 billion won by forging corporate documents.

The FSS is considering the introduction of a new law that holds CEOs of financial firms accountable for such embezzlement and similar crimes by their officials.