South Korea: The Seoul military has announced that a small boat carrying suspected defectors from North Korea has been detained after it entered South Korea’s waters. The crossing was detected on South Korea’s side of the Northern Limit Line, the maritime boundary between the two countries.
The Joint Chiefs of Staff noted that the four people on board were “presumed to have defected” from North Korea. Defections have become more difficult after North Korean leader Mr. Kim Jong Un came to power in 2011. Border controls were also tightened further since the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020.
South Korean authorities did not release further details about the four North Koreans on board. In May, a group of nine North Koreans crossed the western sea boundary aboard a fishing boat and were rescued by the coast guard.
Would-be defectors are typically detained and questioned for up to a month in order to ascertain their motives for leaving the North. They are then sent on to Hanawon, a resettlement centre, where they are prepared for life in South Korea.
Recently, Seoul accused China of forcibly repatriating a “large number” of North Korean defectors. Human rights groups found that as many as 600 North Koreans had been sent back and that they faced imprisonment, sexual violence, or even death once back in the North.
China does not recognise North Korean defectors as refugees. Instead, Beijing claims they are “economic migrants” and has a policy of sending them back, despite pressure from foreign governments and human rights organisations to reconsider its position.
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