SEOUL, Sept 1 — Actor Ha Young will not return for the second season of Netflix’s hit Korean medical drama The Trauma Code: Heroes on Call following controversy over allegations concerning her great-grandfather’s activities during Japan’s colonial rule of the Korean Peninsula.

According to Yonhap, Netflix confirmed today that the actress, whose legal name is Ahn Ha-young, would not appear in the upcoming season after she apologised last month over remarks in which she had spoken about her great-grandfather as a source of family pride.

“Respecting the actor’s position, Ha Young will not appear in the next season of The Trauma Code: Heroes on Call,” Netflix said.

Ha Young played nurse Cheon Jang-mi in the first season of the popular series and had been expected to reunite with co-stars Ju Ji-hoon and Choo Young-woo for Season 2.

The controversy began after Ha Young appeared last month on the KBS talk show Problem Child in House, where she discussed her family’s medical background and said her great-grandfather had studied Western medicine in Japan.

Her comments, made just days before South Korea marked Liberation Day, prompted scrutiny of her great-grandfather’s alleged activities during Japan’s 1910-45 colonial rule of the Korean Peninsula.

The backlash intensified after Ha Young’s agency initially dismissed the allegations as groundless.

Ha Young later apologised, saying she had only partially understood her great-grandfather’s history and was ashamed that she had spoken of him publicly as a source of family pride.