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Senate demands return of USS Pueblo
WASHINGTON - As diplomatic efforts to end a nuclear standoff between Washington and Pyongyang make little headway, a resolution has been introduced in the US Senate demanding that North Korea return an American intelligence ship seized by the hardline communist state 37 years ago. The attack on the USS Pueblo by North Korean naval vessels and MiG jets on January 23, 1968, left one American dead and several more wounded while 82 surviving crew members were captured, held prisoner and tortured for a year.

The Senate resolution demands the return of the vessel, believed still in North Korean hands. "North Koreas inhumane treatment of our sailors, and the refusal of Pyongyang to return this vessel should not be forgotten," said Senator Wayne Allard, who filed the resolution this month after the Stalinist state stunned the world by publicly boasting about its nuclear weapons arsenal. The Republican senator from Colorado said although it had been more than three decades since the "disgraceful episode" occurred, "the United States government should demand the return of the USS Pueblo to the US Navy without further delay."
I sure hope this is more than just a publicity stunt.
Washington has been quite reluctant to demand its return because of the embarrassment caused by the incident. It had to apologize to North Korea for the spying mission before receiving the surviving crew. It was the first US Navy ship to be hijacked on the high seas by a foreign military force in over 150 years.

Fred Carriere, executive director of The Korea Society and an experienced Korea hand, said he visited the ship last year during a trip to Pyongyang with the society's chairman and ex-ambassador to South Korea Donald Gregg. "It was docked in the Tedong River and is still impressive and seaworthy," he told AFP. "From the Korean point of view it is an educational exhibit and one of the most sacred trophies aimed at making the point of history about American invasions of Korea," he said.

It is believed that North Korea had given serious consideration to returning the USS Pueblo to the United States in the spring of 2002 as part of a "confidence building measure," just months before a nuclear standoff flared up in the fall of that year, an Asian diplomat close to Pyongyang told AFP, speaking on condition of anonymity.
Posted by: Steve White 2005-02-24
http://www.rantburg.com/poparticle.php?ID=57251