SEOUL: Travis King defected to North Korea to escape “mistreatment and racial discrimination in the US Army”, state media said on Wednesday, Pyongyang’s first official confirmation they were holding the American soldier.

A private second class with a chequered disciplinary record, King was due to fly back to America in July but instead slipped out of South Korea’s main airport, joined a tourist trip to the DMZ and ran across the border into the North.

A State Department spokesperson said the US government “can’t verify the comments attributed to Private King.” “We remain focused on his safe return, “the spokesperson said on Wednesday. “The Department’s priority is to bring Private King home, and we are working through all available channels to achieve that outcome.”

The United States has previously said that King crossed the border at the Joint Security Area in the Demilitarised Zone separating the North and the South “wilfully and without authorisation”.

US says ‘can’t verify the comments’, but working to free Travis King

Following a North Korean investigation, King “admitted that he illegally intruded”, Pyongyang’s Korean Central News Agency reported.

“Travis King confessed that he had decided to come over to the DPRK as he harboured ill feeling against inhuman maltreatment and racial discrimination within the US Army,” KCNA said, referring to the North by its official name.

King “came to be kept under control by soldiers of the Korean People’s Army” after he crossed the border, KCNA said.

“He also expressed his willingness to seek refuge in the DPRK or a third country, saying that he was disillusioned at the unequal American society,” KCNA said, adding that a government investigation was still ongoing.

The United Nations Command, which oversees the armistice that ended fighting in the Korean War, confirmed last month it had begun a conversation with the North over King.

But US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said at the time that while contact had been made with the North Koreans, Washington still had no idea where King was or in what condition. KCNA did not provide any details about King’s health or location, or about what they planned to do with him.

Propaganda opportunity

North Korea’s first official comment on King was pure propaganda, said Soo Kim, policy practice area lead at LMI Consulting and a former CIA analyst.

“King’s crossing into North Korea provided the Kim regime an opportunity in several ways, the first of which is, of course, the potential for negotiations with the US over King’s release,” she said, adding that Pyongyang were “tough negotiators”, so it would not be easy for Washington to secure his release.

Published in Dawn, August 17th, 2023