South Korea’s military said Sunday that an unidentified person may have crossed the inter-Korean border to North Korea, supporting the North’s claim that a defector returned home a week ago with COVID-19 symptoms. 

The North’s Korean Central News Agency said earlier in the day that the homecoming had prompted leader Kim Jong-un to chair an emergency Politburo meeting, where he raised the country’s coronavirus alert to the highest level and ordered a complete shutdown of the border town of Kaesong.

The South’s military, while looking into the claim, said a person seemed to have crossed over to the North, without identifying if the person was the defector the North mentioned.

“Regarding the North’s report, the military has identified some people involved in the incident and is verifying facts in collaboration with other agencies,” an official said. “The military has mobilized all resources, like surveillance, to reassess our defense readiness.”

Pyongyang said the person was a returnee who had defected to Seoul three years earlier and that he crossed the inter-Korean border on foot. Local media in South Korea, citing defectors here, said the person was probably a man in his 20s surnamed Kim who swam to the South in 2017.

Kim, who was accused of rape before fleeing back to the North, was believed to be facing a police investigation in the South but police declined to confirm whether Kim was the same person that made the escape.

Evidence is yet to be found to support North Korea’s claim that Kim traveled back on foot, with a South Korean government official saying, “It’s likely that the defector swam there, along Ganghwado and adjacent Gimpo.” Ganghwado is an island west of Incheon and Gimpo is north of Incheon.

The Unification Ministry, which handles inter-Korean affairs, said it was still looking into the event without revealing any details about either who Kim was or how he had managed to run back to North Korea when he had two years remaining in the defector protection program organized by the ministry.

The program looks after North Korean defectors for five years upon their arrival here. During the period, defectors are offered police protection in case of Pyongyang’s retaliation.

By Choi Si-young (siyoungchoi@heraldcorp.com)