North Korea defector regains consciousness

Soldier listening to South Korean music and watching American movies

North Korean border guards were only steps behind a fellow North Korean soldier when they opened fire and one briefly crossed the border pursuing the wounded defector as he dashed to the South Korean side, a video released yesterday by the UN Command (UNC) in Seoul showed.

The defector was critically wounded, having been hit at least four times in the hail of bullets as he made his desperate escape on November 13. He was flown by a US military helicopter to a hospital in Suwon, south of Seoul. Doctors announced yesterday that he had regained consciousness, having had two operations to extract the bullets, and his breathing was stable and unassisted.

“He is fine,” lead surgeon Lee Cook-Jong said at a press conference in Suwon. “He is not going to die.”

The surgeon, Lee, gave the soldier’s age as 24 years, and identified him by the family name Oh.

The patient first recovered consciousness on Sunday, and asked where he was in South Korea, Lee said. He was in “agony” when he came to, the surgeon added.

Since then doctors have played South Korean pop music for him, and American action movies.

A UNC official said North Korea had been informed yesterday that it had violated the 1953 armistice agreement, which marked the cessation of hostilities in the Korean War.

The UNC official told a news conference that a soldier from the North Korean People’s Army (KPA) had crossed the Military Demarcation Line (MDL), the border between the two Koreas, for a few seconds as others fired shots at the defecting soldier.