North Korea violated war armistice in firing at defector, U.N. command says

Source: Associated Press

SEOUL, South Korea — A North Korean soldier races for the border in a jeep and then on foot before his former comrades shoot him at least five times as he limps into South Korea, where he collapses and is dragged to safety by southern soldiers on a dramatic video released by the U.S.-led U.N. command Wednesday.

The defection, subsequent surgeries and slow recovery of the soldier have riveted South Korea, but it will be a huge embarrassment for the North, which claims all defections are the result of rival Seoul kidnapping or enticing North Koreans to defect. Pyongyang has said nothing about the defection so far.

North Korea's actions during the defector's Nov. 13 escape at Panmunjom violated the armistice agreement ending the Korean War because North Korean soldiers fired across and physically crossed the border in pursuit of the soldier, Col. Chad G. Carroll, a spokesman for the U.N. command, told reporters in a live TV briefing.

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The U.N. command said the North violated the armistice by "one, firing weapons across the MDL, and two, by actually crossing the MDL temporarily," referring to the military demarcation line that bisects the Koreas. KPA stands for the North's Korean People's Army.

Read more: https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/north-korea-violated-war-armistice-firing-defector-u-n-command-n823186

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For the curious, the soldier did survive, though he was apparently in pretty bad shape even before anyone shot him.