Posted on 07/18/23
| News Source: Associated Press
An American soldier crossed the heavily armed border from South Korea into North Korea, U.S. officials said Tuesday. He went “willfully and without authorization,” the U.S. military said, becoming the first American detained in the North in nearly five years at a time of heightened tensions over its nuclear program.
There were no immediate details about why or how the soldier crossed the border or whether he was on duty. The five U.S. officials spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the matter ahead of a public announcement.
The American-led U.N. Command overseeing the area tweeted earlier Tuesday that the detained soldier was on a tour of the Korean border village of Panmunjom. The soldier purposefully separated himself and ran away from the rest of the group, according to a U.S. official who was not authorized to comment. The official added that it’s “not normal” for active duty service members to go on such tours.
The U.S. military in South Korea also said in a statement that he “willfully and without authorization” crossed the military demarcation line into North Korea.
It said that he is believed to be in North Korean custody and that the U.N. Command is working with its North Korean counterparts to resolve the incident. North Korea’s state media didn’t immediately report on the border crossing.
Cases of Americans or South Koreans defecting to North Korea are rare, though more than 30,000 North Koreans have fled to South Korea to avoid political oppression and economic difficulties since the end of the 1950-53 Korean War.
Panmunjom, located inside the 248-kilometer-long (154-mile-long) Demilitarized Zone, has been jointly overseen by the U.N. Command and North Korea since its creation at the close of the Korean War. Bloodshed and gunfire have occasionally occurred there, but it has also been a venue for numerous talks and is a popular tourist spot.