Americans detained in North Korea: five cases to know

American soldier Travis King was believed to be in North Korean custody Wednesday after crossing the border during a tourist trip to the Joint Security Area in the Demilitarised Zone.

The US-led United Nations Command has said it is working with Pyongyang’s military to “resolve this incident” but the North has a long history of detaining Americans and using them as bargaining chips in testy bilateral ties.

AFP takes a look at five previous cases of US detentions:

Otto Warmbier

Otto Warmbier, a University of Virginia student, was arrested for allegedly removing a political banner from a North Korean hotel, a “crime” for which he was sentenced to 15 years’ hard labour.

Warmbier was detained at the airport as he was leaving the country with a tour group in January 2016 and was paraded in front of reporters in Pyongyang where he sobbed and pleaded for his release, saying he made “the worst mistake of my life”.

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His release was secured after Joseph Yun, the State Department’s then-special representative for North Korea policy, made a secret trip to Pyongyang.

Warmbier arrived home in a coma after nearly 18 months in captivity and died six days later. North Korean officials blamed his condition on medicine they said he took for botulism.

Kenneth Bae, Matthew Miller

Korean American tour operator and missionary Kenneth Bae spent the longest period in North Korean detention of any US citizen arrested there since the Korean War.

In the North legally, he was arrested in November 2012 and sentenced to 15 years hard labour on charges of seeking to topple the government.

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He toiled in a North Korean labour camp from 8 am to 6 pm, “working on the field, carrying rock, shovelling coal”, he told CNN after his release.

Bae faced verbal abuse from North Korean officers, who told him: “‘No one remembers you. You have been forgotten by people, your government. You’re not going home anytime soon. You’ll be here for 15 years. You’ll be 60 before you go home’.”

He was released two years later, along with another US detainee, Matthew Miller, after a secret mission to Pyongyang led by then US intelligence chief James Clapper.

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Miller, then 24, was arrested in April 2014 after he allegedly ripped up his visa at immigration and demanded asylum — and was at first rejected by the North Koreans.

He was later sentenced to six years hard labour and told NK News after his release he had simply wanted to see North Korea for himself.

Laura Ling and Euna Lee

TV reporters Laura Ling and Euna Lee were detained by North Korean guards in March 2009 while on assignment on the China border reporting on refugees fleeing the impoverished regime.

Three months later, they were sentenced to 12 years of hard labour for illegal entry and other offences.

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Their release was secured when former US president Bill Clinton flew to Pyongyang on a surprise mission that year.

The trip was a major propaganda opportunity for the North, with state media saying Clinton had an “exhaustive conversation” over dinner with then North Korean leader Kim Jong Il.

Evan Hunziker in North Korea

Missionary Evan Hunziker swam naked and drunk across the Yalu River from China to North Korea in August 1996, when he was arrested and charged with spying.

He was released three months later after US congressman Bill Richardson travelled to Pyongyang.

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The North Koreans initially demanded $100,000 for Hunziker’s illegal entry into the country but later agreed to free him after his $5,000 hotel bill was paid.

On returning, Hunziker praised his North Korean captors for their “beautiful gesture of peace” for releasing him but he was found dead in an apparent suicide a month later.

Charles Robert Jenkins in North Korea

Drunk after 10 beers, US soldier Charles Robert Jenkins crossed into the North in 1965 while patrolling the DMZ in an attempt to avoid facing combat duty in Vietnam.

He quickly regretted his defection but was held for decades, teaching English to North Korean soldiers and appearing in propaganda leaflets and films.

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He was eventually allowed to leave in 2004 and subsequently spoke out about the dire conditions of life in the North until he died in 2017.