South Korea sent a North Korean man back to his communist homeland Friday after he drifted across the maritime border to the South in a boat in waters off the peninsula's west coast last month, the Red Cross said.

   The man, who has since expressed his desire to return home, was handed over to the North Friday afternoon at the border village of Panmunjom inside the Demilitarized Zone separating the two Koreas, the Red Cross said.

   South Korea rescued him on Dec. 25 after finding him drifting aboard a small motorless boat in waters north of the South's northernmost island of Baengnyeong near the maritime border between the two countries.
  (Yonhap News)