A North Korean ghost ship carrying the remains of at least five people has been found on the Japanese coast, local officials say. The wooden boat was searched by police at 9.30am local time on Saturday on Sado island, off the coast of the country's northwestern shore. Police found the heads of two persons, as well as five bodies. The cause of death is under investigation. Officials could not immediately confirm whether the heads belonged to the five bodies or were from two other people. Investigators described the bodies inside the shipwreck as being partially skeletonised, indicating that they could have been at sea for a significant period of time. The wooden boat had letters and numbers written in Korean on its outside, reports Japanese broadcaster NHK . The bow measures about 7.6 meters long, 4.3 meters wide and two meters high. A police officer first spotted the wooden boat on Friday afternoon but waited until Saturday before entering it due to unstable weather . The discovery on Saturday marks the second time since last month that a wooden boat has washed up on the shores of Sado island. "Ghost boats" from North Korea are a fairly common discovery on Japanese waters and are generally empty or contain only human remains. Exposure and starvation are the most likely explanations for deaths of crewmembers during winter months Some speculation has claimed that some on board "ghost boats" are defectors or spies from North Korean leader Kim Jong-un's repressive regime. Poverty and a lack of food is forcing North Koreans to fish further from home, putting them at risk of death. The grisly find adds to the troubles that Japan and South Korea have with their neighbour North Korea. Ongoing tensions in North's nuclear arms programme could make an investigation difficult to carry out. North Korean leader Kim Jong Un has given the United States until the end of the year to propose new concessions as talks between the two countries have broken down. Also on Friday, Japanese public broadcaster NHK sent a news bulletin that incorrectly reported North Korea had launched a missile that fell into into its waters. It later an apology explaining it was a media training exercise. 'Ghost boat' carrying human heads and 'skeletonised' bodies washes up in Japan North Korea,Kim Jong-un
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