SEOUL: A North Korean soldier was taken into custody by the South after he voluntarily crossed the heavily fortified land border separating the two Koreas on Sunday, Seoul’s military said.

The soldier was seeking to “defect to the South”, a defence ministry official said.

Tens of thousands of North Koreans have fled to South Korea since the peninsula was divided by war in the 1950s, with most going overland to neighbouring China first, then entering a third country such as Thailand before finally making it to the South.

Defections across the land border that divides the peninsula are relatively rare, as the area is densely forested, ridden with landmines and monitored by soldiers on both sides. “Our military secured the custody of one North Korean soldier who crossed the military demarcation line (MDL) in the central front on Sunday,” South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff said in a statement.

“The military identified the individual near the MDL, tracked and monitored him, and conducted a standard guidance operation to take him into custody,” it said.

The MDL runs through the middle of the Demilitarised Zone — the border area separating the two Koreas, which is one of the most heavily mined places on earth.

“The soldier’s likely familiarity with the area may have helped him navigate the heavily mined terrain,” Hong Min, a senior analyst at the Korea Institute for National Unification, said.

“The latest crossing will not be received positively by Pyongyang, as he could provide the South with information on its troop movements and operations in the border area,” added the analyst.

Published in Dawn, October 20th, 2025