Yemi Adebowale
The government of North Korea has detained a US citizen on suspicion of spying, CNN is reporting.
CNN also broadcast an interview with a Canadian citizen who is serving a life sentence in a North Korean labour camp.
On Monday, the news channel said an American man identified as Kim Dong Chul was being held by the Pyongyang government and that authorities had accused him of engaging in spying and stealing state secrets.
CNN displayed Kim’s US passport and said that he had lived in China for many years but had also resided in Fairfax, Virginia.
In an interview with a CNN correspondent, Kim said he had traveled extensively in recent years between China and North Korea and had made some trips to South Korea as well.
In Washington, a State Department official refused to confirm the story. The official said “speaking publicly about specific purported cases of detained Americans can complicate our tireless efforts to secure their freedom”.
The official spoke on grounds of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the situation.
The Canadian citizen, Hyeon Soo Lim, who was born in South Korea, was the head pastor at one of Canada’s largest churches. He has been held by the North since February.
Lim, who was 60 at the time of his arrest, was sentenced to hard labour for life in December for attempting to overthrow the North’s regime.
“I wasn’t originally a labourer, so the labour was hard at first,” Lim said in Korean through an interpreter. “But now I’ve gotten used to it.”
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