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| Version 3 | Version 4 |
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| South Korean Troops Kill Man Trying to Cross Border | South Korean Troops Kill Man Trying to Cross Border |
| (about 5 hours later) | |
| SEOUL, South Korea — South Korean soldiers shot and killed a man who was making a rare attempt to enter North Korea from the South, the Defense Ministry said Monday. | SEOUL, South Korea — South Korean soldiers shot and killed a man who was making a rare attempt to enter North Korea from the South, the Defense Ministry said Monday. |
| The man, wearing civilian clothes, jumped into the Imjin River where it meets the western end of the border between the Koreas before it empties into the Yellow Sea, according to a ministry spokesman, who spoke on the customary condition of anonymity until his office made a formal announcement. The man ignored warnings from South Korean border guards to turn around, the spokesman said. | The man, wearing civilian clothes, jumped into the Imjin River where it meets the western end of the border between the Koreas before it empties into the Yellow Sea, according to a ministry spokesman, who spoke on the customary condition of anonymity until his office made a formal announcement. The man ignored warnings from South Korean border guards to turn around, the spokesman said. |
| “We had to shoot to stop him,” he said. “We retrieved his body, and we are trying to find out who he is and what was his motive.” | “We had to shoot to stop him,” he said. “We retrieved his body, and we are trying to find out who he is and what was his motive.” |
| Cases of people trying to cross the North-South border are rare. It is heavily mined and guarded by layers of barbed-wire fences and hundreds of thousands of soldiers on each side. | Cases of people trying to cross the North-South border are rare. It is heavily mined and guarded by layers of barbed-wire fences and hundreds of thousands of soldiers on each side. |
| And South-to-North crossings are extremely unusual. The last known case was in 2009, when a South Korean wanted on assault charges sneaked past border guards to defect. | And South-to-North crossings are extremely unusual. The last known case was in 2009, when a South Korean wanted on assault charges sneaked past border guards to defect. |
| While about 25,000 North Koreans have defected to the South since a famine hit their country in the 1990s, most of them go through China. But they occasionally cross the North-South border. | |
| Last September, a North Korean civilian defected by swimming across the Imjin and crawling through a military fence along the border west of Seoul. The next month, two North Korean soldiers defected, one of them after killing two of his officers. Last month, an unarmed North Korean defected to a South Korean island where the Imjin joins the Yellow Sea. | Last September, a North Korean civilian defected by swimming across the Imjin and crawling through a military fence along the border west of Seoul. The next month, two North Korean soldiers defected, one of them after killing two of his officers. Last month, an unarmed North Korean defected to a South Korean island where the Imjin joins the Yellow Sea. |