North Koreans’ repatriation comes as South Korea’s newly-elected president is working to enhance inter-Korean ties.
South Korea has repatriated six North Koreans who have been rescued at sea earlier this yr after their vessels drifted throughout the de facto maritime border, Seoul’s Unification Ministry has mentioned.
The North Koreans, who have been picked up by South Korean authorities in separate vessels in March and Might, have been transported throughout the Northern Restrict Line on Wednesday morning with their “full consent” and after that they had repeatedly expressed their want to return residence, the ministry mentioned.
The repatriation was efficiently accomplished with the cooperation of North Korean authorities regardless of repeated failed makes an attempt by Seoul to contact Pyongyang about their return, in line with the ministry.
The event comes as South Korea’s newly-elected president, Lee Jae-myung, is working to bolster ties between the 2 Koreas, which stay in a technical state of conflict after hostilities within the 1950-1953 Korean Conflict ended with an armistice, not a peace treaty.
Talking at a information convention to mark his first month in workplace final week, Lee mentioned that Seoul ought to work to enhance relations in coordination with its ally, the US, and that reducing off dialogue utterly can be a “silly act”.
Final month, South Korea’s navy turned off loudspeakers broadcasting anti-North Korea propaganda throughout the inter-Korean border in one of many Lee administration’s first steps in direction of rapprochement.
South Korea’s Ministry of Nationwide Defence on the time mentioned the transfer would assist “to revive belief in inter-Korean relations” and “promote peace on the Korean Peninsula”.