Thirteen North Korean workers escaped an overseas North Korean restaurant and arrived in Seoul this week, Seoul’s Ministry of Unification (MoU) announced Friday evening.

One male manager and 12 female employees were among the group that arrived, the MoU said in a bulletin distributed to journalists.

“It is first case where a group of North Koreans escaped the same restaurant and came to Seoul,” Jeong Joon-hee, Unification Ministry spokesperson said.

The MoU did not share details about the timing and location of the defection, citing “possible friction with a third country,” though an anonymously sourced Yonhap report said skepticism about North Korea’s political system and