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| China-Japan-Koreas | ||
| Kim travel plan leakers 'face execution' | ||
| 2009-12-01 | ||
Dong-A Ilbo newspaper, quoting sources in the communist state, said today "many North Korean residents'' in the northeastern city of Hoeryong have been charged with espionage. It said they were accused of leaking information on Kim's February 24 "field guidance'' trip to the city to a South Korean internet newspaper and may face execution. Real-time information on Kim's whereabouts is treated as a state secret.
The South's unification ministry, which handles cross-border relations, declined to comment on the Dong-A report. The newspaper did not say when the group was arrested. Daily NK, a Seoul-based Internet newspaper run by opponents of the regime, in February reported almost in real time that Kim had visited Hoeryong, near the border with China. It said its information came from local correspondents using mobile phones. But a Daily NK staffer denied its stringers had been arrested, saying the newspaper talked to them today. "A different group of North Korean residents who had worked for another Seoul-based civilian organisation were caught using unauthorised mobiles in Hoeryong,'' Shin Ju-Hyun, a Daily NK journalist, said. Shin said he was unaware of the fate of those arrested but they could be executed or sent to prison camps. | ||
| Posted by:Steve White |