The US Army has identified a soldier who crossed the demarcation line into North Korea as Pvt. Travis King, a cavalry scout who joined the military in January 2021.
King had been on a tour of a border area as a civilian when he crossed into North Korea on Tuesday, following a yet unclear sequence of events that come at a time of fraught diplomacy and rising military tensions on the Korean Peninsula.
US Forces Korea spokesperson Col. Isaac Taylor said Tuesday that a US soldier “willfully and without authorization” crossed the line during a regular tour of a section of the buffer zone between North and South Korea known as the Joint Security Area (JSA).
“We believe he is currently in (Democratic People’s Republic of Korea) custody and are working with our (Korean People’s Army) counterparts to resolve this incident,” Taylor said in a statement, referring to North Korea’s military.
King’s motive for crossing the border remains unclear. An army official told CNN the private was set to be administratively separated from the US Army after facing disciplinary action for assault.
King’s mother, Claudine Gates, told ABC she was “shocked” after being told by the US Army that her son had crossed into North Korea. READMORE
