Tensions between the United States and North Korea have recently grown following a series of ballistic missile launches.

However, the Biden administration was confronted by a new problem this week when an American soldier crossed into the communist country. 

Soldier accused of committing crimes in South Korea

According to the New York Post, 23-year-old Army Private 2nd Class Travis King first got into trouble this past fall when he was accused of punching a man several times in the face.

This was followed by another incident in which King is said to have caused $460 to a South Korean police call while spitting and shouting expletives at law enforcement.

Fox News reported that while King was expected to return to the United States to face disciplinary action, his military escort was not permitted to accompany him past airport security.

He then escaped from the airport and made his way to the DMZ (Demilitarized Zone) which separates North and South Korea.

Witnesses thought King was playing a TikTok prank

King joined a group of tourists who were visiting the DMZ on Tuesday and at one point managed to rush across the border.

A U.S. National on a JSA orientation tour crossed, without authorization, the Military Demarcation Line into the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK). We believe he is currently in DPRK custody and are working with our KPA counterparts to resolve this incident. pic.twitter.com/a6amvnJTuY

— United Nations Command 유엔군사령부/유엔사 (@UN_Command) July 18, 2023

His actions were witnessed by New Zealand resident Sarah Leslie, who told the Associated Press that she at first believed King was participating in an online prank.

"I assumed initially he had a mate filming him in some kind of really stupid prank or stunt, like a TikTok, the most stupid thing you could do. But then I heard one of the soldiers shout, ‘Get that guy,'" Fox News quoted Leslie as saying.

Claudine Gates is King's mother, and she told ABC News during an interview on Wednesday that she "can't see Travis doing anything like that."

Americans have been treated harshly in North Korea

ABC News added that Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin addressed the incident a day earlier at a press conference alongside Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. Mark Milley.

"We're very early in this event and so there's a lot that we're still trying to learn. What we do know is that one of our service members who was on a tour willfully and without authorization crossed the military demarcation line," Austin said.

Fox News pointed out that this is not the first time that an American has been held in North Korea, with University of Virginia student Otto Warmbier dying there in 2017 almost a year and a half after he was arrested.