Woman wearing North Korean badge found dead near inter-Korean border: ROK police
A woman wearing a North Korean badge has been found dead near a river by the inter-Korean border, NK News confirmed on Monday, at least the fourth body suspected of floating into South Korea from the North in recent weeks.
A South Korean passerby found and reported the body at around 8:30 a.m. on Saturday in a grassland next to the Imjin River near Gunnam Dam, the officer in charge of the case at Yeoncheon Police Station told NK News by phone.
The badge on the body featured portraits of former North Korean leaders Kim Il Sung and Kim Jong Il, the officer said. The evidence suggests that the woman came from the DPRK, as most North Koreans are required to wear a badge of one or both of the former leaders.
The officer said investigators are open to the possibility that the body floated south from North Korea. The body was found 9.6 miles (15.5 kilometers) downstream from North Korea and around 4 miles (6.3 kilometers) from the border by land.
But the officer said the body had decayed too much for authorities to pinpoint her identity, age or cause of death, with investigators conducting an autopsy on the remains.
Notably, Gunnam Dam is downstream from North Korea’s Hwanggang Dam, which often opens its floodgates to release large amounts of water during the summer monsoon season. It did so again in late June without notifying South Korean authorities.
Bodies have reportedly floated from North Korea to the South before, including in 2007 and 2016, and the discovery of the woman in the Imjin River already marks the fourth such case this summer.
A 3- to 7-year-old child was found dead on a tidal flat in front of Gyodong Island in Incheon on July 2. Another child around 10 years old was found dead in the Han River in Gimpo on July 5, and an infant around 6 months old was found floating in the Imjin River in Paju on July 16.
The National Forensic Service (NFS) has concluded that the DNA of the child in the July 5 case does not match any missing children registered in South Korea, an officer at Ilsan Seobu Police Station told NK News on Monday.
The Korean Apparel Industry Association also examined the pants the child was wearing when found and told the police it “could not confirm” where they were produced or sold in South Korea, the officer said. “The pants did not have any labels and were very old.”
“We are still looking through the CCTV, but if there’s no evidence that can confirm that the body was from North Korea, the child will be registered as ‘an individual without family or friends (무연고자),’” the officer said on the phone.
The other cases are still under investigation, and South Korea’s Ministry of Unification told NK News on Monday that if authorities confirm any of the bodies came from North Korea, the ministry’s rules stipulate that the government contact DPRK about repatriating the remains.
If North Korea agrees to accept the remains, South Korea will hand them over at Panmunjom via the Red Cross, the ministry explained. Otherwise, local South Korean authorities will cremate the remains.
Edited by Bryan Betts
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