By Yoo Dong-ho
Staff Reporter

About 460 North Korean defectors will arrive in South Korea on Tuesday and Wednesday on chartered flights from a Southeast Asian country, according to sources Monday.

The first batch of 200 North Koreans will be flown into Seoul Airport in Songnam, Kyonggi Province, on Tuesday morning and will subsequently be sent to Hanawon, the state-run resettlement center for North Korean refugees.

The second batch of 260 North Korean asylum-seekers will make their way to Seoul on Wednesday. It will be the largest single group of North Korean defectors to be allowed into South Korea.

The Foreign Affairs-Trade Ministry, however, declined to specify the Southeast Asian nation involved and exactly when the North Koreans will arrive here, citing security reasons.

On Friday, a high-ranking ministry official confirmed a news report that about 400 North Koreans fleeing their hunger-stricken communist homeland will touch down on South Korean soil early this week.

The Foreign Ministry, however, remained tight-lipped about the North Korean defectors’ exact itinerary, only saying, ``In accordance with diplomatic practice, further details cannot be unveiled due to the strong request of the third Asian country.’’ He added, ``But my understanding is that the initial plan has not been changed.’’

Relevant government agencies have been making combined efforts to prepare for the defectors, establishing interagency debriefing teams and setting up accommodation facilities.

As part of the government’s ``silent diplomacy’’ of behind-the-scenes negotiations as a means of solving the defector problem, the government has redoubled its diplomatic efforts to get the refugees to Seoul since May this year and has recently won the consent of the third country.

The North Korean defectors are awaiting their departure from the Asian country at tightly guarded quarters there. Most of them have been in hiding for more than six months and over 60 percent of those are women and children, according to diplomatic sources.

After going through a month of questioning on an individual basis, the North Koreans will be moved to the resettlement facilities in Ansong, Kyonggi Province, for an eight-week program which provides housing and training to help them adjust to life in capitalist South Korea.

Hanawon can now accommodate 400 defectors at a time and currently only about an additional 100 can be allowed in. The government is seeking ways to send the rest of North Koreans to local government bodies.

Under current laws, a North Korean will receive up to 36 million won ($30,900) in financial support and two-member households and three-member households can get up to 45 million won and 55 million won, respectively.

In the future the amount of funds allotted to help North Korean defectors settle in South Korea is expected to decrease significantly. With the revelation that hundreds of North Korean defectors will arrive in South Korea this week, the government last week decided to cut the settlement fund of 36 million won to 20 million won to deal with the growing number of those fleeing the North. The measure will take effect next January.

Seoul believes the monthly payments have made North Korean defectors here disinclined to seek jobs as they rely heavily on the money they receive from the government. But defectors will be able to receive up to 15 million won in additional financial incentives if they undergo job training, obtain certificates and start jobs.

More than 5,000 North Koreans have defected to South Korea since the Korean War ended in 1953. The number has risen significantly in recent years as the North’s food problems worsen.

Official figures show that 1,285 North Koreans defected to South Korea in 2003, up from 1,140 in 2002 and 583 in 2001. In the first six months of this year, 760 North Koreans were allowed to defect to the South, mostly via China.

yoodh@koreatimes.co.kr