Korea: American soldier deserts and goes to North Korea
The US military is now trying to determine the fate of a US soldier who unauthorizedly crossed the inter-Korean border into North Korea, plunging Washington into a new crisis in its relationship with the nuclear-armed state.
The U.S. Army identified the soldier as Private Travis T. King who enlisted in 2021 and was facing disciplinary action.
During an orientation tour of the Joint Security Area (JSA) on the inter-Korean border, King crossed into North Korea on Tuesday "intentionally and without authorization," said US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin.
“We believe he is in (North Korean) custody and therefore are closely monitoring and investigating the situation and working to notify the soldier's next of kin,” Austin said in a briefing.
North Korean state media made no mention of the incident. His mission to the United Nations in New York did not immediately respond to requests for information.
The soldier was completing his tour of duty in the truce village of Panmunjom when he crossed the military demarcation line that has separated the two Koreas since the Korean War ended in an armistice in 1953, US officials said.
His motive is not known. While residing in South Korea, he was charged with assault and damaging a police car in an October incident. He pleaded guilty and was sentenced in February to a fine, a court document seen by Reuters showed.
King had finished serving in military detention and was flown by the US military to the airport to return to his home unit in the United States, two US officials said.
He had passed through security at his gate alone and then fled, an official said. Civilian tours of the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) are advertised at the airport and King appears to have decided to join one, an official said.
US officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said the soldier faced disciplinary action from the US military. It was unclear whether this was related to the October incident.
The last case of an American defector passed to North Korea dates back to 1982, when Private Joseph T. White crossed the border, among other things after taking a large amount of classified documents. North Korea reported his death by drowning in 1985.
This border crossing comes at a time of renewed tension on the Korean peninsula, with the arrival of a nuclear-armed US ballistic missile submarine on Tuesday and North Korea's test launch of two ballistic missiles at sea on Wednesday.
The short-range missiles were fired from an area near its capital, Pyongyang, flying 550km and 600km before plunging into the sea off its east coast, South Korea's military said.
North Korea has been testing increasingly powerful missiles capable of carrying nuclear warheads, including a new solid-fuel ICBM last week.
The United Nations Command (UNC), which oversees security for the border area, reportedly communicated via a direct line with the North Koreans about the US soldier, a spokesman for the US military in Korea said.
The US military "is working with our KPA counterparts to resolve this incident," Colonel Isaac Taylor said, referring to North Korea's People's Army.
“We communicate with North Koreans every single day,” he said. “It's all part of the Armistice Agreement.”
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The article Korea: American soldier deserts and goes to North Korea comes from Scenari Economics .
This is a machine translation of a post published on Scenari Economici at the URL https://scenarieconomici.it/corea-soldato-americano-diserta-e-passa-alla-corea-del-nord/ on Wed, 19 Jul 2023 14:06:09 +0000.