Seoul: A court on Thursday rejected a request for a warrant to arrest a Chinese dissident who fled China in a rubber boat and arrived in South Korea earlier this week by sea. The Seosan branch of the Daejeon District Court made the decision in a hearing for Dong Guangping, who is accused of violating the Immigration Control Act.
According to Yonhap News Agency, Dong Guangping was discovered by a fishing vessel in waters off Taean, a county on South Korea's central west coast, at 9:36 p.m. Monday, while drifting in a 3.3-meter-long rubber boat. The Coast Guard, dispatched after receiving a report, detained Dong at the scene and took him to Shinjin Port to investigate the circumstances of his entry into South Korean territorial waters.
Dong, who previously served as a police officer and soldier in China, was dismissed from the police force in 1999 after co-signing a letter commemorating the 10th anniversary of the crackdown on protesters at Tiananmen Square in 1989. Following his participation in a Tiananmen Square memorial event in 2014, he was detained by Chinese authorities. Since then, Dong has repeatedly escaped from China and been repatriated several times.