DAEJEON -- A Vietnamese sailor has been sentenced to nine years in prison for stabbing another Vietnamese sailor to death while having a drink together last year, a court said Thursday.

The killing happened on July 20, when the accused and the victim, both 27, were having a drink with four other people at a residence in Boryeong, South Chungcheong Province.

After getting into a fistfight with some of them, the accused went out and returned with a sharp weapon and ended up stabbing the victim. The victim tried to fight him off with a metal pipe but was stabbed again and killed.

The Daejeon District Court said the accused should receive stern punishment considering the gravity of the crime, noting he even tried to escape from the crime scene to hide the weapon after stabbing the victim.

The court did not accept the accused's claim he was in temporary insanity at the time of the crime due to the influence of alcohol, but it took into consideration that the accused had admitted to his crime and repented his actions. (Yonhap)