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7 fishermen from North said to want repatriation

Published: 22 Dec. 2009, 21:48

At Incheon port yesterday South Korean officials inspect a wooden boat on which seven North Koreans apparently drifted in the Yellow Sea. [YONHAP]

Seven North Koreans expressed their desire to return home after they were found drifting south of the Yellow Sea border, a government source in Seoul said yesterday.

The North Koreans were detected by South Korean Coast Guard officers Monday afternoon and have since been under investigation by intelligence and police authorities.

“Roughly speaking, they appear to want [repatriation],” the official, who is well-versed on North Korea-related intelligence, said on condition of anonymity because questioning is still under way.

But the Unification Ministry in charge of inter-Korean affairs could not yet confirm whether the North Koreans wanted to return or intended to settle in the South.

When the joint investigation by the National Intelligence Service and the Coast Guard is complete, and if the North Koreans want to return, the ministry will send a message to North Korea to arrange their repatriation, spokeswoman Lee Jong-joo said.

“We have yet to receive any information about the results of the joint investigation,” Lee said.

Another source said the North Koreans were fishermen who apparently drifted on a 1.5-ton boat when waves were as high as three meters.

In September, a group of 11 North Koreans, consisting of two families, defected to South Korea after crossing the maritime border in the East Sea on a small fishing boat.

In a separate case, a North Korean soldier who was found drifting on a small boat in the Yellow Sea late last month was repatriated after he expressed his desire to return home.

Most North Korean defectors take overland routes that pass through China or a third country to reach South Korea. Maritime defections are rare.

The Koreas exchanged gunfire along the Yellow Sea border in 1999, 2002 and last month, with North Korea rejecting the line unilaterally drawn by the U.S.-led UN Command at the end of the Korean War.

Yonhap