The private, who had a patchy disciplinary record, was scheduled to return to the United States in July but slipped out of the airport, joined a tour of the demilitarized zone that divides the peninsula, and crossed the border into North Korea.
King, 23-year-old according to the press, had to face disciplinary measures in the United States, after participating in a fight in a bar, having had an altercation with the police and having been detained in a jail in South Korea.
The United States had reported that King crossed the border intentionally and without authorization, but so far North Korea had not commented.
“Travis King admitted that he illegally entered the territory of the DPRK,” the KCNA news agency said, using the initials of the country’s official name, Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.
“During the investigation, Travis King confessed that he had decided to come to the DPRK (People’s Republic of North Korea) because he resented the inhumane mistreatment and racial discrimination within the US military,” the agency added.
King “came under the control of soldiers of the Korean People’s Army,” the state news agency said.
“He also expressed his willingness to seek refuge in the DPRK or a third country, saying he was disillusioned with the inequality of American society,” KCNA added.
The United States has no formal diplomatic ties to North Korea, and since North Korea closed its borders at the start of the pandemic, most embassies in Pyongyang have withdrawn their diplomats.
The United Nations Command, which supervises the armistice that ended the hostilities of the Korean War (1950-1953), reported in July that it had begun talks with Pyongyang on this case.
But the head of US diplomacy, Antony Blinken, said that although they had established contact with the North Koreans, they do not know the situation of the soldier.
KCNA did not report on King’s health or where he is, nor did it specify what the North Korean government will do with him.
A propaganda opportunity
For Soo Kim, a former CIA analyst and head of LMI Consulting’s political practice area, told AFP that this announcement about King is pure propaganda.
“King’s Entrance to North Korea it gave the Kim regime an opportunity in several ways. The first of these is, of course, the possibility of negotiating with USA King’s release,” he said.
The North Koreans are “tough negotiators” and it will not be easy for the United States to secure their release, she added.
The country led by Kim Jong Un has a long history of detaining Americans to use as bargaining chips in bilateral negotiations.
“It is also an opportunity for the regime’s propaganda to do its thing: turn the tables to criticize the United States and express Pyongyang’s deep-rooted hostility toward Washington,” he added.
For Vladimir Tikhonov, a professor of Korean studies at the University of Oslo, the fact that King is a black soldier has “certain propaganda value for North Koreans.”
“White racism and the mistreatment suffered by black people is a point that North Korean propaganda tends to emphasize,” he told AFP.
The event comes at one of the worst times in relations between Seoul and Pyongyang, as the North is in a race to develop nuclear weapons and the South has multiplied military exercises with the United States.
The two countries are technically still at war after the conflict in the 1950s ended with an armistice rather than a peace treaty.
The border is heavily militarized, but the shared security area is separated by a concrete wall, which is easy to cross, despite the presence of soldiers.
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AP/Morry Gash
FOUNTAIN: With information from AFP
