South Korea’s Minister of Unification Lee In-young told lawmakers that he is closely watching North Korea on Monday because the country “likely has a COVID-19 situation,” despite the DPRK’s past claims that it has zero cases.

Speaking at a National Assembly’s foreign affairs committee session on Aug. 31, Lee reportedly said that he believes there’s a good chance the DPRK has been infected, emphasizing that this “judgment“ is not based on official intelligence from government sources.

Lee’s comment came after opposition party lawmaker Chung Jin-suk asked if the unification minister “word for word trusts North Korea’s argument that it has no confirmed COVID-19 patient.” Lee responded by saying that he personally believes the DPRK has some cases, but added that there’s a “limitation” to what he “can say publicly,” and that he would have to brief lawmakers privately.

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The remarks come days after a World Health Organization (WHO) representative in Pyongyang, Edwin Salvador, told NK News that North Korea has tested 2,767 people as of Aug. 20 and received all “negative” results.

While North Korea is not reporting any confirmed COVID-19 cases within its territory yet, the government strengthened nationwide quarantine measures to the “maximum emergency” level in late July, when a man redefected from the South and traveled to the North Korean city of Kaesong.

At the time, North Korean state media alleged that the defector was “suspected” of having COVID-19. Later on, WHO stated that the individual’s test produced “inconclusive” results, while South Korean health authorities suggested that it’s unlikely that the man contracted the virus before crossing the border.

Lee, who became the South’s new unification minister in July, previously proposed an idea to build an inter-Korean public health complex in the city of Kaesong or in other areas within the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ). 

Lee argued that a comprehensive inter-Korean system to “diagnose, prevent and treat” infectious diseases is needed because “there is no border in disease and calamities.”

He suggested that this idea could coax the North into reengaging with the South, since the DPRK has already been putting in a lot of effort to improve its domestic health infrastructure with major construction projects like the Pyongyang General Hospital. 

Edited by Kelly Kasulis