(6th LD) N. Korea seizes S. Korean fishing boat: officials

(ATTN: ADDS North Korean fishing boat briefly crossed into South Korean water in
final two paras)
By Sam Kim
SEOUL, July 30 (Yonhap) -- North Korea seized a stray South Korean fishing boat
carrying four crewmembers and hauled it to a port on its east coast on Thursday
despite repeated South Korean warnings, officials in Seoul said.

The 29-ton South Korean boat, 800 Yeonanho, "was tugged to the port of Jangjon at
9:30 a.m.," Lee Bung-woo, a defense ministry spokesperson in Seoul, said in a
briefing.
South Korea sent a message calling for the immediate release of the boat, which
had been floating in North Korean waters as early as 5:05 a.m., the Joint Chiefs
of Staff (JCS) said in a release.
Lee said a crewmember on the boat reported a malfunction with the satellite
navigation system via commercial link shortly before it was seized 7 miles (11km)
into North Korean waters at 6:27 a.m.
The seizure comes as a South Korean worker remains detained in North Korea since
March over allegations that he defamed its ruling system and encouraged defection
at a joint factory complex just north of the inter-Korean border.
Ties between the Koreas unraveled after South Korean President Lee Myung-bak took
office early last year with a pledge to bolster pressure on Pyongyang to drop its
nuclear weapons programs.
North Korea retaliated by suspending reconciliation talks and threatening armed
conflict along their border. Tensions heightened further after the communist
state conducted its second nuclear test in May and test-fired ballistic missiles
off the east coast.
The seized South Korean boat did not respond to initial requests by South Korean
naval vessels trying to identify it, JCS spokesman Park Sung-woo said.
"The ship was out of the reach of our radars when it crossed the Northern Limit
Line (NLL)," the de facto inter-Korean maritime border, he said. "The boat was
also tiny and built with reinforced plastics, which made it hard to identify the
vessel with radars."
South Korean patrol boats moved closer to the NLL and warned North Korea twice to
"reciprocate by releasing the fishing boat" after the seizure, he said.
The South Korean Navy says it sent back two stray North Korean fishing boats on
June 30 and July 5, respectively.
The incident on Thursday marks the third time since 2005 that a South Korean
fishing boat has been seized by North Korean authorities.
The two previous boats, which also strayed across the boundary, were released
after five and 19 days, respectively, according to officials.
The 800 Yeonanho departed from the port of Geojin on the eastern coast at 1:30
p.m. on Wednesday and sailed past the NLL as far as 20 miles (32km) off the port
of Jejin, officials said.
Geojin is about 150km northeast of Seoul and 15km south of the Demilitarized Zone
that divides the Koreas.
Skippered by a man only identified by his last name, Park, the boat, which was
operating in the East Sea and mainly fishes for squid, was scheduled to return
home Friday morning, Lee said.
The NLL was drawn in 1953 by an American commander of U.N. forces that fought on
the South Korean side in the Korean War, which ended in a truce rather than a
peace treaty.
In the meantime, the JCS said a North Korean fishing boat briefly crossed into
the South's waters on its west coast at 5:13 p.m. on the same day.
The North Korean boat, likely experiencing engine failure, was towed by a North
Korean patrol boat at 6:04 p.m., it said.
(END)