North Korea has announced it will release on Friday a South Korean fishing boat and its crew captured last week for "illegally" sailing into its waters, a state media report said.
The vessel and its crew would be released "at the military boundary in the East Sea", the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) said.
North Korea "decided to repatriate the boat and its crew from the humanitarian point of view, taking into account the fact that all the crewmen honestly admitted their offence, repeatedly apologizing and asking for leniency", Xinhua news agency quoted the KCNA report as saying.
An investigation showed that the fishermen entered North Korean waters on October 21, the report said.
--IANS
ksk/mr
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