WorldSEOUL (Reuters) - South Korean guards fired up to 20 warning shots at North Korean troops searching for a soldier who had defected on Thursday, Yonhap news agency said, after officials in the South confirmed the latest defection across the heavily militarized border. Thursday’s defection came about five weeks after another North Korean soldier suffered critical gunshot wounds during a dash across the border on Nov. 13. Two North Korean civilians found in a fishing boat had also sought to defect, officials in the South said on Thursday. In the latest North Korean military defection, a low-ranking soldier crossed the border at around 8:04 a.m. (2304 GMT Wednesday), South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff spokesman Roh Jae-cheon said. “Today a North Korean soldier defected through our military’s general outpost in the center-western region,” Roh said

Source: Sunday Times December 21, 2017 03:00 UTC