S. Korea's road fatality rate second highest among OECD members

South Korea is near the bottom in terms of traffic safety among developed countries, with its traffic fatality rate being the second-highest among surveyed countries despite improvement over the past decade, data showed on Monday.

The number of South Koreans killed on the road reached 105 per 1 million people in 2011, ranking 30th among 31 countries of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) that provided the data.

South Korea's reading, although an improvement from 119 in 2009 and 218 and 2000, is much higher than the OECD average of 63, they showed.

Poland topped the list with 109, and the United States and Greece came in third and fourth, respectively, with 104 and 97, while Britain recorded the lowest rate of 31, the data showed.

South Korean pedestrians were the most vulnerable among the OECD member countries in 2011, with 4.1 road deaths for every 100,000 people. The country's reading compares with the OECD average of 1.4, the data showed.

More child pedestrians were killed in road accidents here than in any other OECD nations other than Slovenia, which tied with 1.1 deaths per 100,000 children aged 14 or younger. (Yonhap)