North Korean border guards were merely steps behind a North Korean soldier when they opened fire at him in a desperate bid to stop him crossing the border to the South Korean side, a video has shown.

The footage also revealed that one of the North Korean soldiers chasing the defector crossed the border, the U.N. Command (UNC) in Seoul said.

The defection, subsequent surgeries and slow recovery of the soldier have riveted South Korea, but it will be a huge embarrassment for the North, which claims all defections are the result of rival Seoul kidnapping or enticing North Koreans to defect. Pyongyang has said nothing about the defection so far.

North Korea’s actions during the defector’s November 13 escape at Panmunjom violated the armistice agreement ending the Korean War because North Korean soldiers fired across and physically crossed the border in pursuit of the soldier, Col. Chad G. Carroll, a spokesman for the UN command, told reporters in a live TV briefing.

The video shows the soldier speeding down a tree-lined road, headlights on, past dun-coloured fields and shocked North Korean soldiers, who begin to run after him.