The vagueness surrounding North Korea's recent arrests of two U.S. journalists on its border with China is a hallmark of Pyongyang's relationship with the world and a powerful tool for dictator Kim Jong Il's authoritarian regime.
The regime has said little about its detention of Laura Ling and Euna Lee of Current TV LLC of San Francisco since North Korean border soldiers arrested the two on March 17 near the Chinese city of Tumen.
Pyongyang has issued only two brief statements about the women, the latest saying they would stand trial for illegal entry and hostile acts toward the country. Pyongyang hasn't officially notified Washington of the charges, a State Department spokesman said Friday.
Two men working with the women got away from the North Korean border guards. One of them, an American cameraman named Mitch Koss, left China shortly after the incident and hasn't spoken publicly since. The other is a Chinese guide whose whereabouts aren't known.
South Korean protesters hold pictures of two American journalists detained by the North during a rally on Thursday in Seoul.
Current TV is a San Francisco-based media company launched in 2005 by former Vice President Al Gore and businessman Joel Hyatt that broadcasts user-generated and professional content over cable TV and online. About a third of its on-air broadcast is user-generated video.
Ms. Ling, the sister of television personality Lisa Ling, and Ms. Lee work for Vanguard, a team of correspondents that produce a weekly show on international affairs targeting young adults. In January, Ms. Ling, a vice president of Vanguard, said in a news release that "while other outlets are scaling back on their international investigations, the 'Vanguard' team is pushing the envelope. ... We're taking risks and using all of our resources to pursue the important stories that need to be told."
Current TV executives declined to comment about the situation, as did Mr. Gore. The women are the first American civilians arrested in North Korea since 1996.
The detentions create a delicate situation for U.S. diplomats as North Korea prepares to launch its missile. The two reporters were working on a story about North Koreans who flee the closed country to make a better living in China, a situation that has persisted for decades and is embarrassing to both Pyongyang and Beijing.
In the case of the journalists, the overarching desire to get them out may force the U.S., the company and their families to accept seeing the women paraded in show trials and forced to sign statements of guilt. "North Korea's intractability eventually leads people to cave in to their unreasonableness," said Victor Cha, a National Security Council member in the Bush administration and deputy negotiator in the six-party talks with North Korea.
North Korea's two statements are creating confusion about how serious a situation the women face. The use of the language "hostile acts" in the second statement has left analysts wondering if that means espionage. North Korean civil law books, reviewed in Seoul, are vague. Espionage convictions come with severe penalties, such as five to 10 years, or longer, in a gulag-like prison.
"There are no precedents that are open to the public" for determining the North's course in the matter, says Lee Kyu-chang, research fellow at the Korea Institute of National Unification, a government-affiliated think tank.
No comments:
Post a Comment