The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees has begun interviewing one-hundred-36 North Korean defectors serving a month-long detention in Thailand for illegal entry.

An official of the U.N. agency's Thai office told Voice of America on Wednesday that the purpose of the interviews is to determine what the defectors want and to which country they wish to go.

Regarding the 18 North Koreans originally scheduled to fly to South Korea on August 18th, the official said the South Korean government is apparently waiting for the media buzz to fizzle out as it wants to handle these matters discreetly.