Nine or potentially more South Koreans from a civic group are to be fined for making illegal contact with North Koreans in Shenyang, China, South Korea’s Unification Ministry (MoU) told NK News on Wednesday.

Under South Korean law, meetings with North Koreans by South Koreans which are not approved by the MoU – especially if the meeting is pre-planned and has a clear agenda – are punishable by a penalty of up to three million Korean won (US$2,673).

“We will take legal actions against those who have violated the law,” an official from the press office of Ministry of Unification (MoU) told