North Korea diplomat flees to South in highest ranking envoy defection since 2016

A senior North Korean diplomat based in Cuba defected to South Korea in November, becoming the highest-ranking North Korean diplomat to escape to the South since 2016.

Without giving any further details, South Korea’s spy agency the National Intelligence Service confirmed an earlier report by the Chosun Ilbo newspaper, which said that a counsellor responsible for political affairs at the North Korean embassy in Cuba had defected.

Among Ri Il-kyu’s jobs at the embassy was to block North Korea’s rival South Korea and old ally Cuba from forging diplomatic ties, the newspaper reported citing an interview with Ri. In February, the two countries established diplomatic relations.

Related: North Korean defectors to South tripled in 2023, Seoul says

Details on North Koreans defections often take months to come to light, with defectors needing to be cleared by authorities and going through a course of education about South Korean society and systems.

Ri entered North Korea’s foreign ministry in 1999 and received a commendation from North Korean leader Kim Jong-un for successfully negotiating with Panama to lift the detention of a North Korean ship caught carrying arms from Cuba in 2013, Chosun said.

He told the newspaper he had decided to defect over disillusionment with the regime and unfair evaluation of his work.

“Every North Korean thinks at least once about living in South Korea. Disillusionment with the North Korean regime and a bleak future led me to consider defection,” he told the paper.

“In fact, North Koreans yearn for reunification even more than South Koreans. Everyone believes that reunification is the only way for their children to have a better future. Today, the Kim Jong-un regime has brutally extinguished even the slightest hope left among the people.”

He said he flew out of Cuba with his family but he did not elaborate further on how he pulled off the high-risk escape.

“I bought flight tickets and called my wife and kid to tell them about my decision, six hours before the defection. I didn’t say South Korea, but said, let’s live abroad,” he said.

Ri said he made a final decision to run when his request to travel to Mexico for medical treatment was denied last year, adding that his parents and parents-in-law who might face reprisals for his defection had passed away.

North Koreans caught attempting to defect face severe punishment, including death, according to human rights groups and defectors who have been successful.

Fewer North Korean defectors have been arriving in South Korea in recent years due to strict limits on border crossings into China and hefty broker fees, human rights groups and experts say.

In 2023, 196 North Korean defectors came to Seoul, down from as many as 2,700 a decade ago, South Korean government data showed.

Most of those North Korean defectors who recently defected to the South are the ones who had long lived overseas, like the diplomat Ri, human rights activists say.

The last such known high-profile defection to the South was that of Tae Yong-ho , a former North Korean deputy ambassador to the United Kingdom, in 2016.

Other notable defections include that of the acting ambassador to Italy, Jo Song-gil , in 2019 and the acting ambassador to Kuwait, Ryu Hyun-woo , in 2021, who held the ranks of first secretary and counsellor respectively, according to the Chosun Ilbo.

South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol on Sunday promised better financial support for North Korean defectors and tax incentives for companies hiring those defectors, as he attended the ceremony for the inaugural North Korean Defectors’ Day.

North Korea last year shut some embassies in an effort to “rearrange its diplomatic capacity efficiently”, closures that South Korea says indicates the North is struggling under the burden of sanctions.

North Korea maintains an embassy in Cuba, though its ambassador returned home in March, according to media reports.

Reuters and Associated Press contributed to this report