UN Command talking to North Korea about US soldier Travis King
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[July 24, 2023]
By Hyunsu Yim
SEOUL (Reuters) - The United Nations Command and North Korea have begun
discussing the case of Travis King, the U.S. soldier who crossed into
the North last week, the deputy commander of the U.S.-led command that
oversees the Korean War truce said on Monday.
King, a U.S. Army private serving in South Korea, sprinted into North
Korea on July 18 while on a tour of the Demilitarized Zone on the
inter-Korean border, landing Washington in a fresh diplomatic quandary
with the nuclear-armed North.
Conversations between the UNC and North Korea's military were initiated
and conducted through a mechanism established under the Korean War
armistice, according to Lieutenant General Andrew Harrison, a British
Army officer serving as deputy commander of the multinational force.
"The primary concern for us is Private King's welfare," Harrison told a
media briefing, declining to go into detail about the contact with the
North.
"The conversation has commenced with the KPA through the mechanisms of
the Armistice agreement," Harrison said, referring to the North's Korean
People's Army.
"I can't say anything that could prejudice that process."
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North Korea's state media, which has usually commented whenever U.S.
nationals have been detained, has remained silent about King.
The incident comes at a time of heightened tension on the Korean
peninsula. Last week, North Korea conducted ballistic missile tests
hours after a U.S. nuclear-armed ballistic missile submarine arrived at
a South Korean port.
It was the first such visit since the 1980s, and served a blunt reminder
to the North that Washington always has nuclear-tipped missiles deployed
within close striking distance.
North Korea is banned under U.N. Security Council resolutions from using
ballistic missile technology, which Pyongyang defiantly rejects.
Tours to the border truce village, known formally as the Joint Security
Area (JSA), were suspended after King bolted across the border.
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![](../images/072423PIX/news_u71.jpg)
U.S. Army soldier Travis King appears in
this unknown location, undated photo obtained by REUTERS
![](http://archives.lincolndailynews.com/2019/Sep/05/images/ads/current/stclara_lda_SPONSOR_090519.png)
People joining those tours, which are overseen by the UNC, need to
sign up well in advance to get approval and are supposed to follow
strict rules, including what they can wear, for the tour.
It remained a subject of an ongoing inquiry how King was authorized
to go on the tour despite his record, Harrison said.
King had served detention in South Korea on charges of assault and
damaging public property and was due to fly back to his home base in
Fort Bliss, Texas last week to face disciplinary action.
When asked if the plan is to keep the area open to the public,
Harrison said when or how the JSA part of these tours would resume
was yet to be decided.
"It's a constant balance between that value (of educating the
public) and the risk to the individuals who are in the Demilitarised
Zone," he said.
On Saturday, the North fired a barrage of cruise missiles toward the
sea to the west of the Korean Peninsula. On Monday, another U.S.
nuclear-powered submarine arrived in South Korea.
Late last week, North Korea warned that deployment of U.S. aircraft
carriers, bombers or missile submarines in South Korea could meet
criteria for its use of nuclear weapons.
(Reporting by Hyunsu Yim; Writing by Jack Kim; Editing by Ed Davies
& Simon Cameron-Moore)
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