North Korean Soldier Crosses DMZ to Defect, South Says

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/09/30/world/asia/north-korea-soldier-dmz-defector.html

Version 0 of 1.

SEOUL, South Korea — A North Korean soldier defected to South Korea on Thursday morning, sneaking across the countries’ land border, which is heavily guarded with armed sentries, minefields and barbed wire fences.

The South Korean military provided few details in a brief statement announcing the defection. It said officials were debriefing the soldier to determine his motive for leaving the North.

Nearly 30,000 people from North Korea have defected to the South since the end of the Korean War in 1953. The three-year war was halted with a cease-fire, not a peace treaty, leaving the peninsula technically at war and divided by the so-called Demilitarized Zone, a 2.5-mile-wide buffer.

The vast majority of defectors have traveled through China to reach the South. Defectors who cross the Koreas’ land or sea border are rare.

A North Korean soldier defected by crossing the Demilitarized Zone last June, the first to do so in three years. He later told officials that he had fled because of widespread beatings and other abuse within the military. Both Koreas have conscript armies.