Global Courant
Pvt. Travis T. King, the American soldier who fled across the inter-Korean border into North Korean territory on July 18, was taken into custody on Wednesday, according to a senior US government official, after North Korean state news media announced this was the case. decided to expel him.
The U.S. official spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss efforts to free Private King.
After a 70-day investigation, North Korea found Private King guilty of “illegally entering” its territory and decided to deport him, the North’s official Korean Central News Agency said. The news agency said Private King confessed to entering North Korea illegally because, it said, he “felt ill against inhumane mistreatment and racial discrimination within the U.S. military and was disillusioned with the unequal American society.”
North Korea had not said how or when it planned to deport Private King. He had fled north through the demilitarized zone, which separates North and South Korea.
There was no immediate comment from the Pentagon.
It is unusual for North Korea to deport an American soldier who has expressed a desire to seek asylum there. In the past, the country allowed American soldiers who defected to its side to live there and even start a family. It often used them as a propaganda tool, portraying them as evil American military officers in anti-American films.
Private King, 23, was assigned to South Korea as a member of the First Brigade Combat Team, First Armored Division. After being released in July from a South Korean detention center where he had spent time for abuse, he was escorted by U.S. military personnel to Incheon International Airport, just outside Seoul, to board a plane to the United States, where he was expected to face further disciplinary action. action.
He never got on the plane. Instead, the next day he took a bus to the border village of Panmunjom, which is within the DMZ and open to tourists.
The soldier “willfully and without authorization crossed the military demarcation line into the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea,” Col. Taylor, the public affairs officer for U.S. Forces Korea, said at the time.
Last month, North Korea said Private King wanted to seek refuge in the isolated communist country or in a third country. Wednesday’s announcement did not elaborate on why it had decided not to grant his wish.
Private King was the first known American to be held in North Korean custody since Bruce Byron Lowrance was held for a month after illegally entering the country from China in 2018.
Civilian Americans accused of illegal entry have been prosecuted and sentenced to hard labor, or sometimes released and expelled.
Robert Park, a Korean-American missionary who crossed the border between China and North Korea in 2009, was held in the North for 43 days before being deported by plane to Beijing. In 2013, Merrill Newman, an American retiree, was held for 42 days before being flown from Pyongyang, the North Korean capital, to Beijing.
In the cases of some US citizens accused of illegal entry, North Korea has also used them as a bargaining chip in negotiations with Washington, with which the country has no formal diplomatic ties.
In 2009, North Korea arrested two American journalists, Laura Ling and Euna Lee, at the border with China, on charges of illegal entry and “hostile acts.” They were released five months later when President Bill Clinton visited Pyongyang and met with Kim Jong-il, then North Korean leader.
In 2010, another American, Aijalon Mahli Gomes, held on similar charges, was released when former President Jimmy Carter visited Pyongyang to ask for his release and, according to North Korea, “apologized” for the man’s crime. In 2014, Kenneth Bae, a Korean-American missionary, was released after the U.S. government sent then-Director of National Intelligence James R. Clapper Jr. to Pyongyang.
