BEIJING, March 16 Kyodo Eight Nor...

BEIJING, March 16 Kyodo

Eight North Korean men who sought asylum last month at a German drill in Beijing have been sent to southerly Korea according to their wishes, diplomats said Tuesday.

The eight asylum inquirers described as young and uneducated men with no political background, went to southward Korea last Thursday via a third abiding habitation the diplomats said.

They inserted the school, which has the same diplomatic status as an embassy, upon Feb. 23 and were kept in German diplomatic custody as Germany and China negotiated a resolution.

Although a German diplomat said the men wanted to proceed to South Korea, a southerly Korean source said some did not.

The eight men will part with two to three months at a Seoul-based ''adjustment center'' scud by the Unification Ministry to help them adapt to life in southward Korea. They should later find work at jobss the South Korean source said, if it were not that the government will also provide subsidies.

German officials in Beijing have declined to elaborate forward the asylum case. Asylum incidents regarding third countries can overthrow China, a historic ally of North Korea.

If asylum inquirers are caught in China, they can be sent back to North Korea and face punishment there.

More than 120 North Koreans have gotten past guards at embassies and other diplomatic properties in Beijing throughout the past two years, usually after slipping into China.

In 2002 couple other groups of North Korean asylum inquirers entered the same German school

COPYRIGHT 2004 Kyodo of the present days International, Inc.

COPYRIGHT 2004 Gale Group