South Korea has detained a North Korean man who is believed to be trying to demarcate the heavily armed land border by separating the two countries.
According to South Korean media reports, the man was seen crossing a barbed wire fence as early as 7.30pm on Tuesday.
He was apprehended at 9.50am on Wednesday when surveillance equipment found him at the eastern end of the demilitarized zone. [DMZ], A 248 km long (155 mi) strip of land drawn from mines.
It was not immediately clear if the man was a soldier or a civilian, although reports said he was not in uniform.
A statement from South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff said, “Investigations are planned to find out details about the man, including how he came down and whether he intends to show defects.”
The defense ministry declined to confirm the Yonhap news agency’s report, saying the army had issued an “anti-Zindogagi” infiltration warning for the eastern border area.
The incident comes weeks after a South Korean Fisheries Ministry official was killed after entering North Korea through the countries’ maritime border, and was shot dead by North Korean soldiers, his body burned to the ground and set on fire. The tension increased. The Far South intelligence agency said this week that it had “conditional evidence” that North Korean leader Kim Jong-un had launched an investigation into the shooting.
Very few of the 1,000 North Koreans who have turned south in the last two decades have done so through the DMZ, which is the scene of occasional military clashes, but also the arrangement of border negotiations during the detention period. Most of the defectors go to China and the third country comes south through Thailand.
In 2018, a North Korean soldier was led to South Korea by the eastern part of the DMZ, while another was shot by his compatriots, while in 2017 he escaped dramatically to the South and ran across the border.
On Wednesday, a year after being suspended due to an outbreak of African swine fever in North Korea, South Korea began a tour back to its border village of Panmunjom, and more recently, concerns about the spread of coronavirus.
South’s unification minister, Lee In-young, called for free travel for all Koreans inside the DMZ and for a free inter-Korean hotline, not to mention suspicious insults at a ceremony Wednesday to consider the resumption of tours. Reinstalled.
“The establishment of round-the-clock communication channels will be the basis for restoring inter-Korean relations,” Lee said.
North Korean state media have not commented on Wednesday’s incident on the border, which has separated countries since the end of the 1950-53 Korean War. South Korea has said it has not seen any unusual activity by the North’s military.
