In another move to pressure Seoul to release the four North Korean defectors, Pyongyang posted videos of interviews of relatives pleading them to return home.
The families alleged that the South held the four involuntarily after their ship accidentally crossed the border on 5 February, said AFP.
"My husband is not a man who would betray the mother country which nurtured and encouraged him... for what reason would he ever defect?" wife of the 44-year-old defector Hong Yong-Hak.
She further said, "I strongly urge them to return my husband and the rest to their home country where their families are waiting."
"Father, I miss you. Please come back now!" Hong's teenage daughter said.
South Korea has been repatriating the other 27 co-passengers who crossed the Yellow Sea border but Pyongyang is firm that it wants all the 31 to come home.
The isolated communist state wants the South to bring the defectors to a meeting at the Panmunjom border but the latter preferred to invite the North to visit them in their country.
The UN have interviewed the four and confirmed that they freely decided to stay in the South.
The Washington Post said that it is difficult to say whether the North Koreans in the video had been coached prior to the interview. It is unlikely that impromptu media appearances will be released by Pyongyang.
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