Boat Engineer Asks to Be Sent Back to the North

South Korea said it would repatriate a North Korean after learning that he was brought to the South against his will by other defectors and wants to return home.

Ri Kyong Sung, 33, reportedly was found tied up in the engine room of a fishing boat that carried him and 20 other North Koreans to the South on Monday. “I have parents, a wife and kids in the North. I have no reason to come to the South,” the Chosun Ilbo newspaper quoted Ri as saying.

The other defectors told investigators that they tricked Ri, the chief engineer on the boat, to go south. South Korea planned to send him back today through the border village of Panmunjom.