North Korea: U.S. Journalists Crossed Border With 'Motives to Stifle and Insult' Nation
North Korea says detained U.S. journalists confessed to illegal entry.
June 16, 2009 -- U.S. journalists Laura Ling and Euna Lee, who were sentenced to 12 years in a North Korean labor camp last week, were reportedly filming video while entering the country illegally, which, according to North Korean media sources, prompted their arrest.
In a rare report today describing the incident and the trial process, North Korea claimed that the two journalists admitted to illegal entry and accepted their sentences to 12 years in a labor camp.
The two women, who were arrested in March while reporting for Al Gore's Current TV along the Chinese-North Korean border, were found guilty last week on charges of "hostilities against the Korean nation and illegal entry," which, until today's report, were relatively vague.
The detailed report, released by the official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) and entitled "Befitting Judgment for American Criminals Committing Anti-National Acts of Hostility," says that from the point when the journalists were planning the trip in the United States, to their research trip to South Korea, and then to China, the video-taped content "show[s] their acts of hostility prompted by extremely rude political motives to stifle and insult our nation's images."
The report says that Ling and Lee crossed the borders from China into North Korea with "political intentions to abuse and slander the human rights situation in our country and to isolate and stifle the socialist system of the DPRK by concocting false video footage," which is why the National Criminal Law No.69 of a "hostile act toward the nation" was applied.
In their video tape, the journalists are reportedly recorded saying, "We have just entered the North Korean territory without permission," and filmed themselves picking up a stone as a token of crossing the border. According to KCNA's report, the video illustrates why the journalists were sentenced for illegal entry.
The KCNA said today it is announcing details "to inform the world about the crimes the Americans have committed" at a time "when unprecedented confrontational situation against the U.S. has been created on the Korean peninsula."
