Seoul:
A North Korean defector wore a diving suit and fins in the course of a daring six-hour swim about one of the world’s most fortified borders, a Seoul official stated, and was caught only immediately after apparently falling asleep.
Bungling South Korean forces did not spot the man’s audacious exploit regardless of him appearing numerous instances on CCTV immediately after he landed and triggering alarms, drawing heavy criticism from media and opposition MPs.
Even immediately after his presence was noticed, the man — who made use of diving gear to make his way by sea about the Demilitarized Zone that divides the peninsula — was not caught for yet another 3 hours.
The man, reportedly in his 20s, landed north of the town of Goseong on the east coast.
“He presumably had swum for about six hours, wearing a padded jacket inside a diving suit and fins. His clothing appeared to have kept him warm and allowed him to stay afloat,” an unnamed Joint Chiefs of Staff official was quoted as saying by Yonhap news agency on Tuesday.
Tidal currents worked in his favour, the official stated, and he abandoned most of his gear prior to producing his way by way of a drainage channel beneath the barbed-wire fences that run along the coast.
Over more than 3 hours surveillance cameras caught him eight instances, audible alarms sounding twice, but border guards did not notice.
Eventually a manhunt was launched, and troops discovered him 3 hours later, apparently asleep, his facemask hanging in a tree.
Officials say the defector, presumed to have been a civilian in the North, has expressed a need to defect.
The military acknowledged troops had “failed to abide by due procedures” and vowed to strengthen border safety.
And in a parliamentary hearing on Tuesday, Defence Minister Suh Wook acknowledged that surveillance systems in the location have been “malfunctioning and outdated”.
Only a handful of Northern defectors ever straight cross the DMZ or swim previous the maritime border — despite the fact that the final such publicly identified incident was in November, when inquiries about safety have been also raised.
The vast majority of defectors alternatively 1st travel to neighbouring China, occasionally staying there for years prior to producing their way on to the South by way of third nations.
More than 30,000 North Koreans have fled to the South more than the decades but numbers plummeted to just 229 final year, immediately after Pyongyang imposed a strict border closure to safeguard itself from the coronavirus that 1st emerged in neighbour and crucial ally China.
The incident was proof the South Korean military was “close to a near collapse”, the conservative Chosun Ilbo newspaper stated Wednesday.
“Is this unit the only unit not doing its job properly? We think not,” it added in an editorial.
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