SEOUL: A North Korean army officer has crossed to South Korea across the heavily fortified land border in the first such defection by an officer in a decade, defence officials said on Monday.

A spokesman for the Joint Chiefs of Staff said the incident took place on Sunday and the man was being questioned by investigators.

“It marks the first defection by a North Korean military officer since 1998,” the spokesman said.

The frontier is reinforced by barbed wire and strewn with millions of landmines. The spokesman gave no other details on the latest case. Yonhap news agency said the 28-year-old lieutenant crossed near the truce village of Panmunjom and asked for asylum.

Most refugees from the hardline communist North cross into China and then try to travel on to third countries, from where they seek resettlement in South Korea or elsewhere.

“He is being questioned by the joint review committee of related offices, but I understand he has made it clear that he wishes to stay in the South,” an unnamed military official told Yonhap.

North Korean soldiers, especially officers, defect relatively seldom, defence officials say. Under a Songun (army first) policy the 1.1 million-strong military enjoys greater privileges than civilians.

More than 12,000 North Koreans, mostly civilians, have defected to the South since the end of the 1950-53 Korean War, according to the unification ministry.—AFP