SEOUL: Four of the 31 North Koreans whose boat crossed into South Korean waters last month are unwilling to be sent home, Seoul's unification ministry said Thursday. The North has demanded the return of the group, whose boat crossed the tense Yellow Sea border in thick fog on February 5.
Ministry spokeswoman Lee Jong-Joo said the South notified the North Thursday that four of them wish to remain in South Korea. The message said the 27 others would be repatriated on Friday through the border village of Panmunjom. Lee said no reply had yet been received from the North.
There had earlier been conflicting reports on whether any of the 31, who were questioned by the South's intelligence officials, wished to remain. The South normally returns North Koreans who drift across the border by accident and who express a wish to go home.
The incident comes amid continuing high cross-border tensions as US and South Korean troops stage a major military exercise. The North brands the drill as a rehearsal for invasion of its territory and threatens to turn Seoul into a "sea of flames" in case of any provocation.
A spokesman for the South's Red Cross, which is officially handling arrangements, said the fishing boat would be handed back off the South's border island of Yeonpyeong on Friday if the North agrees.
The boat carrying 11 men and 20 women had crossed the border near Yeonpyeong, which was shelled by the North's artillery last November. Two marines and two civilians were killed. More than 20,000 North Koreans fleeing their impoverished homeland have arrived in the capitalist South since the end of the 1950-1953 war, mostly via China.
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