NK diplomat defects, SK politician says

SEOUL: North Korea’s acting ambassador to Kuwait has defected to South Korea, the latest in a recent string of highprofile escapes from the isolated country, a South Korean politician said yesterday.

Ryu Hyun Woo had led North Korea’s embassy in Kuwait since former ambassador So Chang Sik was expelled after a 2017 UN resolution sought to scale back the country’s overseas diplomatic missions.

Ryu defected to South Korea last September, according to Tae Yong Ho, who was North Korea’s deputy ambassador to Britain before settling in the South in 2016 and being elected as a lawmaker last year.

Kuwait had been a key source of foreign currency for Pyongyang, which sent thousands of labourers there, mostly for construction projects.

The National Intelligence Service declined to comment.

Ryu fled several months after Jo Song Gil, who was North Korea’s acting ambassador to Italy, vanished with his wife from the embassy and resurfaced in South Korea. — Reuters