Private Travis King is set to be expelled from North Korea (Picture: AP)
North Korea has decided to expel a US soldier who crossed into the country through the heavily armed border with South Korea in July.
The North’s official Korean Central News Agency said on Wednesday that authorities have finished their questioning of Private Travis King.
It said that he confessed to illegally entering the North because he harboured ‘ill feeling against inhuman maltreatment and racial discrimination’ within the US Army.
The agency did not say when authorities plans to expel the soldier.
Mr King, who had served in South Korea, sprinted into North Korea while on a civilian tour of a border village on July 18, becoming the first American confirmed to be detained in the North in nearly five years.
King sprinted into North Korea whilst he was on a civilian tour (Picture: AP)
Tourists near a border station at Panmunjom in the Demilitarized Zone in Paju, South Korea(Picture: AP)
At the time he joined the civilian tour and crossed the border, he was supposed to be heading to Fort Bliss, Texas, following his release from prison in South Korea on an assault conviction.
Following weeks of silence, North Korea confirmed in August that it had detained Mr King and was questioning the circumstances surrounding his border crossing.
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