2023-10-20 05:49:33
Updated Friday, October 20, 2023 – 05:49
A television screen shows a file image of American soldier Travis King.Ahn Young-joonAP
The US Army accused the US soldier of several crimes, including desertion. Travis King, who illegally crossed into North Korea last July and was detained and deported to the United States.
According to the documentation in which the charges appear, obtained by the Washington Post, King was accused of violating the legal code of the US Army by committing crimes such as desertion, assault, disobedience to a superior officer, insubordinate conduct, making false statements, and attempting to solicit sexual photographs of a minor.
The White House reported on September 27 that the 23-year-old soldier was in US custody after being deported from North Korea, a country he had entered irregularly across its border with the South last July.
King crossed the Military Demarcation Line (MDL) on July 18 and entered North Korean territory without permission taking advantage of a tourist visit to the border between the two Koreas.
The soldier, who was serving in South Korea, was going to be repatriated to the United States as a disciplinary measure for his problems with South Korean justice, but He escaped to North Korea where, according to Pyongyang, he requested asylum.
The regime of Kim Jong-un He announced his deportation in September after concluding an investigation into the case about which no further details have been provided.
During the investigations, Travis King confessed that he entered North Korea illegally “because he harbored resentments against inhumane mistreatment and racial discrimination within the US military,” said the North Korean state news agency KCNA.
It took Pyongyang a month to publicly confirm King’s arrest and the United States admitted difficulties in contacting the North Korean government, with which it does not have diplomatic relations.
Before fleeing to North Korea, King had spent 48 days in a South Korean penitentiary institution because he did not pay the fine imposed in February for an incident with the Police in Seoul.
The soldier was going to be returned to the United States but escaped from the Seoul airport where he was to take the flight home, according to the Pentagon after the incident.
The charging documents, notes the Washington Post, claim that King left his barracks in South Korea without permission in the fall of 2022 and that he consumed alcohol against the rules.
Additionally, he kicked a sergeant in the head during an incident in October 2022 and requested lewd photographs of a minor via Snapchat.
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