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I thought that Laura Ling and Euna Lee would be out of NKorea relatively quickly (definitely not longer than a year but then I read this and I was pretty surprised):
http://www.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/asiapcf/06/04/journalist.north.korea/index.html#cnnSTCText?iref=werecommend
The guy spent 2 years in prison! and he was definitely being used as a bargaining chip. Hmmm…..
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Reporters get 12-year terms in N. Korea
(CNN) – Two U.S. journalists who were detained in North Korea while covering the plight of defectors living along the China-North Korea border have been sentenced to 12 years in labor camps, the country’s state-run media said Monday.
The Central Court of North Korea sentenced Laura Ling and Euna Lee for the “grave crime they committed against the Korean nation and their illegal border crossing,” the Korean Central News Agency said.
As a result, the court sentenced the women to “12 years of reform through labor,” meaning they will serve out their sentence in a labor camp.
The U.S. State Department said it had seen the reports of the convictions and was trying to confirm it with Korean authorities.
“We are deeply concerned by the reported sentencing of the two American citizen journalists by North Korean authorities, and we are engaged through all possible channels to secure their release,” said spokesman Ian Kelley in a statement. “We once again urge North Korea to grant the immediate release of the two American citizen journalists on humanitarian grounds.”
Ling and Lee were taken into custody March 17. They are reporters for California-based Current TV, a media venture of former U.S. Vice President Al Gore.
According to media reports, the trial began Thursday. Much of the time, the only news coming from the secretive and isolated communist nation is relayed through the state media.
he U.S. State Department was informed by the Swedish ambassador to North Korea that no observers were allowed in the courtroom
Sweden represents the United States in North Korea, because the two countries, which fought on opposite sides during the three-year Korean War in the 1950s, do not have diplomatic relations.
The State Department was notified the reporters had a defense attorney, but was not given the lawyer’s name.
Several senior administration officials said the idea of sending either Gore or New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson to Pyongyang on a mission to get the journalists released has been floated to the North Koreans.
No answer has come so far, but the expectation is that once the trial ended the North would accept a visit by either Gore or Richardson to secure their release.
Richardson served as the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations and energy secretary during the Clinton administration, and he has maintained contacts with North Korea. He took several trips there as ambassador, and he has worked for the release of people held by the North Koreans in the past.
North Korea charged the reporters with illegal entry into the country, “hostile acts” and spying.
The women’s families broke months of silence last week, making public pleas for their release.
“When the girls left the United States, they never intended to cross into North Korean soil. And if they did at any point, we apologize,” Laura Ling, Ling’s sister, said Wednesday.
“And we know that they are very, very sorry. And we ask that you show mercy today,” added Ling, a special correspondent for CNN.
Contact with the women has been extremely limited.
The Swedish ambassador was allowed to see them three times.
Despite the limited communication, the families said they’d heard enough to know the women were “terrified” and “extremely scared.”
I don’t know what to say. I am truly hopeful that negotiations will be successful [especially since I am sure they are just using the reporters as a bargaining chip for their own personal gain] but something has got to change….
