North Korean defects by sea to South Korea

Seoul: Reports say a North Korean man in his 30s has defected to South Korea.

South Korea`s Yonhap news agency cites an unidentified government source as saying the defector crossed the western sea border in a small boat Tuesday.

Yonhap said a guard on the South Korean-controlled Baengnyeong Island led the man to safety.

South Korea`s top spy agency would not immediately comment.

Tensions are high on the divided peninsula after a South Korean warship sank off the island`s coast in March in what investigators say was a strike by a North Korean torpedo. Forty-six sailors drowned.

South Korea`s Unification Ministry says than 18,000 North Koreans have arrived in the South since the Korean War ended with a 1953 cease-fire.

Bureau Report