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Euna Lee and Laura Ling, the two Current TV reporters nabbed by North Korean border guards while they were doing a story about human trafficking on the Chinese-North Korean border, have been sentenced to 12 years hard labor in what former U.N. Ambassador Bill Richardson has called a "high-stakes poker game" that has more to do with our nuclear relations than it does with these women and their alleged crimes. A Korean-language TV station has reported that the women were convicted of "hostility toward the Korean people."
North Korea issued warnings today to fishing boats to stay clear of the country's eastern coast, raising concerns about an upcoming missile test. KCBS reports that a professor in South Korea believes the 12-year sentence is relatively meaningless, saying the issue "will be resolved diplomatically in the end." The U.S. State Department, which has no formal diplomatic ties with North Korea, has demanded their release. Fox News is reporting that Al Gore may hop over there to help negotiate their release, but take their reporting with a grain of salt.
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"I'm so ronery, so ronery, so ronery and sadry arone..."
God, what an ordeal.
Am I wrong in thinking that they were arrested for trying to sneak into the country? That sentence seems incredibly harsh but... were they illegally entering North Freaking Korea????
If that's true (and it may well be) they should be deported, not detained.
Why is that? Is there an international law about defending sovereign borders? Or is that just an opinion?
It's called being decent to your neighbors. Like if you're old and kids are playing on your lawn, you say "GET OFF MY LAWN!"
But you don't send them to a forced labor camp in your basement. That wouldn't be cool at all.
They were, according to the story, on the Chinese side of the border at the time of their arrest, and they were taken in by an aggressive North Korean border guard and essentially pulled over to the N. Korean side. What they were doing was probably risky, however I don't believe they willfully tried to enter N. Korea.
It's so rare for them to get visitors, they don't want to let them go. They are the Annie Wilkes of the world community.
Okay, that's hilarious.
The journalists were found guilty of committing a "grave crime" against North Korea and of illegally entering the country
They were "entering the country", alright... with bags over their heads and in the back of a van they were just thrown into.
I suspect this has something to do with the nature of the story they were working on.