SEOUL - A North Korean soldier whose boat drifted across the border with South Korea during a fishing trip was sent home Wednesday at his own request, the US-led United Nations Command said.

The South Korean navy rescued the sergeant in the Yellow Sea on Sunday after currents swept his makeshift styrofoam raft south of the maritime border while he was laying fishing nets.

The soldier expressed his desire to return home when he was jointly interviewed by the UN Command and neutral nations which supervise the armistice that ended the 1950-53 Korean War.

He crossed the inter-Korean border at Panmunjom, a traditional point of contact between North Korean military authorities and the UN Command since the end of the conflict.

Each side has in the past returned people who crossed the sea border accidentally. But tensions have grown in the Yellow Sea since a brief naval clash there on November 10, the first for several years.

South Korea said it suffered no casualties but set a North Korean patrol boat ablaze. The North's casualties were unknown.

The North refuses to recognize the current sea border and demands it be redrawn further to the south.