By Ryu Jin
Staff Reporter


A group of 29 people claiming to be North Korean asylum seekers barged into a South Korean school in Beijing early Friday morning, officials said.

The group, consisting of six males and 23 females, with two children aged between five and eight, entered the school around 9 a.m. through its rear gate, according to the diplomatic officials.

``After removing a lock, they headed straight for the main building and entered the principal’s office,’’ said one of the officials. ``They then identified themselves as North Koreans wanting to go to South Korea.’’

A number of North Korean defectors have entered foreign missions in China, including the South Korean Embassy, but it is the first time that a group has sought asylum in a South Korean school, which enjoys few extraterritorial rights.

It comes a week after 20 North Korean asylum-seekers stormed into the South Korean Consulate in the Chinese capital.

Currently more than 130 North Koreans are believed to have taken refuge in the South Korean Embassy, awaiting China’s approval to travel out of the country. Other defectors in Beijing include 44 at the Canadian Embassy and 24 at a Japanese school, according to officials.

Over 5,900 North Koreans have defected to South Korea since the Korean War ended in 1953, including 583 in 2001, 1,139 in 2002, 1,281 in 2003 and about 1,300 so far this year.

The National Intelligence Service, South Korea’s spy agency, said on Thursday that the number of North Koreans coming to Seoul is expected to exceed 10,000 a year in a couple of years.

By some accounts, around 200,000 North Koreans are living in hiding in China, having fled poverty and repression in their communist homeland, most of them eager to come to South Korea.

An the closest communist ally of the North, China refuses to recognize North Koreans as refugees, insisting they are temporarily staying in its territory to obtain food. A treaty with Pyongyang obliges Beijing to repatriate any North Korean illegally in China.

The Seoul government’s official position is that any North Korean defectors in third countries should be allowed to travel to South Korea if they so desire. Concerned about possible negative influence on inter-Korean relations, however, Seoul has been keeping its handling of the thorny issue low-key.

When South Korea airlifted 468 North Korean refugees from a Southeast Asian country in early September, Pyongyang launched a barrage of harsh criticism, accusing Seoul of kidnapping them.

International relief officials anticipate that the number of North Korean defectors will increase significantly in the future, encouraged by a new U.S. law aimed at improving human rights conditions in the communist country.

The law, put into effect last week, authorizes the U.S. government to spend up to $24 million (27 billion won) every year during the 2005-2008 period to help international groups that aid North Korean escapees.

North Korea has denounced the U.S. law as an ``undisguised plot’’ to overthrow its communist system. The North is in conflict with the United States over its nuclear weapons program.

jinryu@koreatimes.co.kr