By The trickle of North Korean refugees defecting by boat to South Korea continues:
Reports say a North Korean man in his 30s has defected to South Korea.South Korea’s Yonhap news agency cites an unidentified government source as saying the defector crossed the western sea border in a small boat Tuesday.
Yonhap said a guard on the South Korean-controlled Baengnyeong Island led the man to safety.
South Korea’s top spy agency would not immediately comment.
Tensions are high on the divided peninsula after a South Korean warship sank in March in what investigators say was a strike by a North Korean torpedo. Forty-six sailors drowned.
South Korea’s Unification Ministry says more than 18,000 North Koreans have arrived in the South since the Korean War ended with a 1953 cease-fire. [Stars & Stripes]
This guy had to have defected across the heavily patrolled Northern Limit Line. I’m sure South Korean intelligence will be interested to hear what the North Koreans living on the northern side of the NLL are saying about the sinking of the Cheonan.
1:36 pm on June 5th, 2010 1
I thought they didn't tell the rank and file people about stuff like the sinking a ROK ship.
2:53 pm on June 5th, 2010 2
I sure they DID tell them that the sinking was an act of 'imperialist conspiracy' or some crap like that…
3:52 pm on June 5th, 2010 3
The only thing the average North Korean really knows about the Cheonan is what they hear either first or second hand from information originating in South Korea. Those getting it first hand either hear/see it directly from South Korean tv or radio, by cell phone, or by some other means.
6:53 pm on June 5th, 2010 4
Anyone claiming to escape from North Korea is automatically granted refugee status. No one would be turned away and sent back. But how is it possible to vet their background? They have to also be considered to be an infiltrator.
What would happen if Kim Jeong Il took a queue from Castro with the Mariel Boatlift? What would happen if North Korea put all their hardcore criminals and mental patients on boats and sent them south?
10:12 pm on June 5th, 2010 5
The ROK intelligence agencies have them go through a very lengthy screening and assimiliating process. The high number of previous DPRK citizens and other HUMINT assets are a pretty effective measure to weed out the black sheep or the wolves in disguise. Of course many still do manage to infiltrate ROK as DPRK refugees, but the ROK government does a descent job neverthless as can be seen in this link:
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/asia/…
10:29 pm on June 5th, 2010 6
Your typical refugee showing up in South Korea has what by most standards (certainly by American/western standards) is a harrowing story of how he/she got there. Most of them were practically starving to death in North Korea – they narrowly escaped to China – spent 2-5 years in China dodging the authorities (both Chinese and North Korean) while eeking out some kind of existence – and finally they made their way down to a southeast Asian country like Thailand – waited several more months – and from there, they finally got a ticket to Inchon Int'l.
All those years spent in China and southeast Asia don't occur in some black hole vacuum. While they are there, they come into contact with people and agencies that the South Korean authorities can contact to verify the refugee's story.
They also create a "paper trail" (cell phone usage, email, contact with churches, etc., etc.) during their journey.
Obviously, some agents are able to slip through the system undetected. But many times something in their story or a lack of verifiable history of activity in China trips them up.