A US citizen released after six months’ detention in North Korea arrived in Seoul yesterday after he left the North with a US delegation, South Korean news media said.
Eddie Jun, a US citizen of Korean ancestry, came to Seoul via Beijing after he flew out of Pyongyang with the US group led by Robert King, US special envoy for human rights and humanitarian issues.
“I have to go to hospital now. I’ll have a chance to talk to you later,” Jun told journalists upon arrival at Incheon International Airport. He was then whisked away in a minibus, Yonhap news agency said.
Wearing a black zip-up jacket and black trousers, he looked in relatively good health and walked without help despite his detention in the North since November last year on unspecified charges, Yonhap said.
Earlier yesterday, King and Jun arrived in Beijing aboard a flight of Air Koryo, the North’s state airline.
“We are very happy to report that Mr Jun, the American citizen who’s being held in Pyongyang, has been released,” King told reporters on arrival in Beijing. “We are also delighted that within a day or two he’ll be able to be back with his wife and family.”
King said Washington had not offered food aid in exchange for his freedom.
“We did not negotiate or agree to any provision of food assistance. That’s an issue that will have to be made in Washington,” he said.
Jun, a California-based businessman, had been detained for apparent missionary activities in the hardline communist state.
King’s departure came a day after North Korea said it had decided to free and return Jun “on humanitarian grounds in consideration of repeated requests” by recent US visitors to Pyongyang, including King.
King was at the head of a team to assess whether to resume US food aid to the hungry state. UN agencies say that 6 million North Koreans urgently need assistance.
Lim Chang-ho, a professor at a South Korean theological college, said earlier this month that Jun had engaged in “aggressive” missionary activities in the North.
Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) is to visit Russia next month for a summit of the BRICS bloc of developing economies, Chinese Minister of Foreign Affairs Wang Yi (王毅) said on Thursday, a move that comes as Moscow and Beijing seek to counter the West’s global influence. Xi’s visit to Russia would be his second since the Kremlin sent troops into Ukraine in February 2022. China claims to take a neutral position in the conflict, but it has backed the Kremlin’s contentions that Russia’s action was provoked by the West, and it continues to supply key components needed by Moscow for
Japan scrambled fighter jets after Russian aircraft flew around the archipelago for the first time in five years, Tokyo said yesterday. From Thursday morning to afternoon, the Russian Tu-142 aircraft flew from the sea between Japan and South Korea toward the southern Okinawa region, the Japanese Ministry of Defense said in a statement. They then traveled north over the Pacific Ocean and finished their journey off the northern island of Hokkaido, it added. The planes did not enter Japanese airspace, but flew over an area subject to a territorial dispute between Japan and Russia, a ministry official said. “In response, we mobilized Air Self-Defense
CRITICISM: ‘One has to choose the lesser of two evils,’ Pope Francis said, as he criticized Trump’s anti-immigrant policies and Harris’ pro-choice position Pope Francis on Friday accused both former US president Donald Trump and US Vice President Kamala Harris of being “against life” as he returned to Rome from a 12-day tour of the Asia-Pacific region. The 87-year-old pontiff’s comments on the US presidential hopefuls came as he defied health concerns to connect with believers from the jungle of Papua New Guinea to the skyscrapers of Singapore. It was Francis’ longest trip in duration and distance since becoming head of the world’s nearly 1.4 billion Roman Catholics more than 11 years ago. Despite the marathon visit, he held a long and spirited
China would train thousands of foreign law enforcement officers to see the world order “develop in a more fair, reasonable and efficient direction,” its minister for public security has said. “We will [also] send police consultants to countries in need to conduct training to help them quickly and effectively improve their law enforcement capabilities,” Chinese Minister of Public Security Wang Xiaohong (王小洪) told an annual global security forum. Wang made the announcement in the eastern city of Lianyungang on Monday in front of law enforcement representatives from 122 countries, regions and international organizations such as Interpol. The forum is part of ongoing