SEOUL/WASHINGTON — A US soldier going through disciplinary motion fled throughout the inter-Korean border into North Korea on Tuesday and was believed to be in North Korean custody, US officers mentioned, making a contemporary disaster for Washington in its dealings with the nuclear-armed state.
Colonel Isaac Taylor, a spokesperson for the US Armed Force in Korea, mentioned a US service member on an orientation tour of the Joint Security Area between the Koreas “wilfully and without authorization crossed the Military Demarcation Line into the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK).”
“We believe he is currently in DPRK custody and are working with our KPA counterparts to resolve this incident.” Taylor said, referring to North Korea’s People’s Army.
Reuters could not immediately confirm the identity of the person, but two US officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said the soldier had been due to face disciplinary action by the US military.
South Korea’s Dong-a Ilbo daily, citing South Korea’s army, identified the person as Travis King, a US army soldier with the rank of private second class. The newspaper later deleted the name.
CBS News said that before the incident the soldier was being escorted back to the United States for disciplinary reasons, but after going through airport security somehow returned and managed to join the border tour.
It said a person who said they witnessed the event and was part of the same tour group told CBS News they had just visited one of the buildings at the site when “this man provides out a loud ‘ha ha ha,’ and simply runs in between some buildings.”
CBS cited the witness as saying that military personnel reacted within seconds to the man’s actions, but initially, there was confusion.
“I believed it was a foul joke at first, however when he did not come again, I noticed it wasn’t a joke, after which all people reacted and issues received loopy,” it quoted the witness as saying.
According to CBS, the witness said there were no North Korean soldiers visible where the man ran, and that the group has been told there hadn’t been since the coronavirus pandemic, when North Korea sought to seal its borders.
The crossing comes at a sensitive time amid high tensions on the Korean peninsula, with the arrival of a US nuclear-armed ballistic missile submarine in South Korea for a rare visit in a warning to North Korea over its own military activities.
North Korea has been testing increasingly powerful missiles capable of carrying nuclear warheads, including a new solid-fuel intercontinental ballistic missile launched last week.
The White House, the US State Department, the Pentagon and North Korea’s mission to the United Nations in New York did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
The Joint Security Area is in the demilitarized zone border that has separated the two Koreas since the end of the 1950-53 Korean War.
The man was with a group of visitors, including civilians, to the Panmunjom truce village when he suddenly bolted over the brick line marking the border, Donga and the Chosun Ilbo daily newspapers reported, citing South Korean army sources.
The US State Department tells US nationals not to enter North Korea “as a result of persevering with critical threat of arrest and long run detention of US nationals.”
US school pupil Otto Warmbier was detained by North Korean authorities whereas on a tour of the nation in 2015. He died in 2017, days after he was launched from North Korea and returned to the United States in a coma. — Reuters
Source: www.gmanetwork.com
