(CNN) — North Korean President Kim Jong Il has pardoned and ordered the release of two U.S. journalists, state-run news agency KCNA said Wednesday.
The announcement came after former U.S. President Bill Clinton met with top North Korean officials in Pyongyang to appeal for the release of Laura Ling and Euna Lee, who had been arrested while reporting from the border between North Korea and China.
“Clinton expressed words of sincere apology to Kim Jong Il for the hostile acts committed by the two American journalists against the DPRK after illegally intruding into it,” the news agency reported. “Clinton courteously conveyed to Kim Jong Il an earnest request of the U.S. government to leniently pardon them and send them back home from a humanitarian point of view. “The meetings had candid and in-depth discussions on the pending issues between the DPRK and the U.S. in a sincere atmosphere and reached a consensus of views on seeking a negotiated settlement of them.”
The report said Clinton then conveyed a message from President Obama “expressing profound thanks for this and reflecting views on ways of improving the relations between the two countries.” But White House spokesman Robert Gibbs told reporters in Washington before the announced agreement that Clinton was not carrying any message — written or oral — from Obama. Gibbs added that the former president last spoke with Obama during a White House visit in March. He described Clinton’s trip as a “solely private mission to secure the release of two Americans.”
The report from the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, the nation’s official name, described the agreement to release the journalists as “a manifestation of the DPRK’s humanitarian and peace-loving policy”.
You gotta love the comedian who wrote that. But seriously, if Bush was president, they would have been left to rot.
Hmmm. Perhaps America is changing for the better. Nicely done Bill.
Riker17, your way of thinking… where confrontation and retaliation is preferred over conciliation and diplomacy… is hopefully terminally ill.
#28 – riker17
Let me guess, your favorite movie is “Dr Strangelove”, and you think the ending was just the way things should have worked out.
One thing that we all can be thankful for: ‘Dubya’ Bush / Rumsfeld / Cheney were not in charge during the Cuban Missile Crisis… the world would be a radiated glowing ember right now had they been in charge… think about it and cringe.
As for you Riker17 (name based on course on the ultra-lame Star Trek character… unsurprisingly)… the only explanation for your remark is that you were dropped on your head – repeatedly – as a child. There there.. have a cookie… let your mommy clean up the slobber currently dripping from the side of your mouth.
#32 thanks… I had a good chuckle…
🙂
Actually, Clinton had struck a deal with the PRK to supply them with PW reactors, incapable of making nuclear bomb material. The GOP-controlled congress scuttled the deal, and the PRK went ahead with its two breeder style reactors and some additional technology bought from the Pakistani renegade scientist AQ Khan.
And to think we consider Pakistan an ally.
@#24 “Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter, because the world respects them…” No. Because they sold American values for enemy hugs. Exactly the same as in this situation: respect is given to a thug just because he held hostages. Not a diplomacy but sell-out. Would it be worth our values to press for release without any recognition or (likely done) backdoor deals?
This reminds me of a recent documentary about British abdicated king Edward and how welcome he was with Nazis, Italians and Spanish dictatorships. World respected him? Same as with Clinton and Carter. I’d prefer Churchill like sacrifice and endurance any time.
Roland Hedley Tweeted: “Clinton begins long flight home in private plane with two attractive, naive, deeply beholden young women. Safe travels!”
Or we could have used the ultimate right-wing hero/icon/diety as an example, and outright traded arms (including TOW missiles) for hostages:
President Reagan was forced to address the nation on March 4, 1987 and acknowledge he indeed swapped arms for hostages:
“A few months ago I told the American people I did not trade arms for hostages. My heart and my best intentions still tell me that’s true, but the facts and the evidence tell me it is not. As the Tower board reported, what began as a strategic opening to Iran deteriorated, in its implementation, into trading arms for hostages.”
(I can see it now…. the right wingers in this forum with their hands clasped over their ears, chanting “I can’t hear you… LA LA LA LA LA… I can’t hear you….”)
Maybe the right wing should DEMAND that Obama follow Reagan’s glorious example, and get the three idiot American tourists that were captured on the Iranian side this week, by trading some nice high tech weaponry. Go ahead, demand that he follow that example… I double-dare you.
Happy to see our favorite president of all time save two young girls from years in prison.
So what if Kim Dingdong made up a story around it. His credibility is really non-existent so it’s all good.
# 37 LOL So true, so true!
Well first, I would appear that sitting presidents never cross party lines for help. So Bush II would have had to call on his elderly father, to go “negotiate” with some foreigners. Reagan was not an option, for obvious reasons. So that’s most probably why that never happened.
Second, I can’t recall the Republicans ever sending a proxy president to “negotiate” in place of the current one. So I guess it’s just not done. Say what you will about Clinton and Carter. But they’ve seemed to keep the peace, more than Bush I, Reagan, Ford, or Nixon cared to do. When those guys retired, they took the hole they crawled into, with them. You may have noticed that only Dick Cheney vocally defends the policies of his former rule. I think he was the real president, all alone for those eight years. Bush II just pretended he was.
I can’t help but suspect that all these captured tourists and journalists are really CIA paid plants or pawns. Thus their capture gives the US the excuse to “negotiate” with our adversaries, and give them some valuable asset, that wouldn’t have looked so good to agree to, under other conditions. This “let’s hike along the border” ploy is wearing a bit thin, don’t you think? I mean, what the hell’s the attraction?!
Besides, if the US were really serious about sneaking “reporters” and “hikers” across the borders. They’d employ mexicans, who are much better at avoiding capture.
An Ex-president went independently to a hostile nation and single handedly secured the release of 2 political prisoners.
BUWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH11111
Most republican’s are now neurotic conspiracy theorists that cannot deal with the fact that there’s a black man sitting in the oval office. Everything they say, do, or think is jaded by this (to them) unthinkable reality.
So here we have Gore sending in 2 young and pretty reporters to a nation that’s “hostile toward America” and has all these “dangerous nuclear weapons” and “run by a madman” so that he can get the inside story for his Current TV project and the reporters get “caught trespassing” and arrested and sent to “12 years of hard labor” and then his good friend Bill Clinton who has Kim Jong on speed dial is the only one that can get them out and you think that it’s so amazing and he’s a hero. ROFL. You have all been punked.
OMG! Every 10-minutes they’re talking about this story this morning, and they’re even shoe-horning Al Gore into the mix.
Oh, here’s a good one, the reporter has just stated “how clean the hangar is, no oil, grease or fuel spills…” Here’s a news flash! It’s a aircraft hangar! They’re usually maintained better than a car garage… Idiots!
Oh it was a private mission… right! You know damn well “Hillary” cleared it and that it had Obamas blessings.
When are we going to see a congressional investigation into who sent these women to violate the laws of a sovereign foreign country? Weren’t they working under the direction of the ex-vice president?
I want to see some accountability, at least to the extent that Current TV (Algore) should repay the taxpayers for this debacle. If B.O. makes CEOs pay for their lunch at the Whitehouse, then its only fair that Algore and Current TV pay for this mess.
Mildly amusing to hear the wingnuts here rationalize their hatred. 🙂
>Most republican’s are now neurotic conspiracy theorists that cannot deal with the fact that there’s a black man sitting in the oval office. Everything they say, do, or think is jaded by this (to them) unthinkable reality.
Good job of projecting your own feelings. Yes, liberals do go crazy when there is a black man or woman who is a Republican. Or if it’s a woman, which explains their rabid fixation on Sarah Palin. They even attacked Ricky Martin for singing at Bush’s inauguration
I think a lot of the comments prefer meanness instead of knowledge or thoughtfulness. It could start with the unnecessary headline. That really was a cheap shot. The comments just followed the lead.
Still, diplomacy often has not-really-secret arrangements which are labeled to save face in order to get out of truly stupid actions.
As far as the two journalists go: 1) it can be very easy to wander across borders without realizing it – anywhere in the world and 2) don’t forget about the Japanese women who were kidnapped in Japan by North Koreans and taken back to NK. No one knew until a few years ago what had happened to the women – ordinary women gong about daily life, in Japan. Any nation which would go across a sea to capture people engaged in nothing more than daily life might also cross a simple land border to capture people engaged in observation.
And what is the meanness with regard to these two young women and to Al Gore, to Bill Clinton, even Pres. Obama? What, is your only status in life tied to petty viciousness?
Generally, it seems that these types of comments seem to be thrown out from pre-existing talking points. Often they seem not to have read the whole thing, not to have read carefully (story, comment, or original source) and to have constructed straw arguments in order to have something, anything, to yell.
I am glad to see that by the latter part of the comments at least some decency seemed to have entered to conversation.
It’s funny how offended some idiots get when the government uses diplomacy instead of aggression. You fuking idiots seem to have learned nothing, if you want your children to live in a somewhat peaceful environment, in a country that is somewhat prosperous, you had better stop suggesting that we “bomb” everyone. The shortsightedness of the red-neck fundamentalist, conservative fukheads is just down-right scary, you fuking morons seem to have forgotten how to speak to people without threatening to blow them to hell. Then you act surprised when nobody likes you, or someone fights back.
# 53 Pedro,
seems like you can’t count and you can’t spell.
“terrorist threats” Laughing so hard I nearly pissed myself.
Do you think the boogeyman is going to get to as well? I suggest you start doing a little reading and try and get a hold of reality son, you are so fucking stupid you seem to have convinced yourself there have been terroist threats from North Korea??? Get your fucking head out of the sand you stupid stupid stupid arsehole. North Korea was invented by your government as a threat, they fabricated the threat by making them part of the “axis of evil” and because people like you are so god-damned stupid, you just ate it all up like good little sheep. Then when they thought they may be blown to hell along with the Iraqi’s that didn’t do anything wrong, they decide they should make some defenses to try and fend-off the aggressor. That allows the crazy idiots to feed you more crap about them arming themselves, when all they really want is to survive against the aggression. Stop watching television and eating McDonalds you stupid arsewipe, there is a big world out there and it’s not the way you’ve been led to believe…..sheep moron.
#35, dusan,
. . . they sold American values for enemy hugs. Exactly the same as in this situation: respect is given to a thug just because he held hostages. Not a diplomacy but sell-out.
How sad it is. You don’t know the difference between deference and respect. There is NO respect for North Korea. Because they have a mad man in control, a large army of robots, a very dictatorial mindset, and a few nuclear devices they are given deference.
The Bush Administration would have left the two women to rot in a NK hell hole and used that as a talking point on how bad NK was. Saner heads will try to work things out, find some common ground, and work for their release. That is called diplomacy and it worked.
Carter brought Egypt and Israel together and brought peace to the Middle East. Of course, Reagan and Bush I didn’t follow up, but that is another story. Clinton again halted Israel expansion through diplomacy. He also helped stop the Bosnian and Kosovo genocides. Something tells me that you think the Bosnian and Kosovo populations should have been eliminated.
#54, Watcher,
With all due respect sir, please go easy on Pedro. Or, as he is also affectionately known, ‘dro. He is not an American. He claims to be from Venezuela but really lives in Cuba under Raol’s protection while emulating RuPaul in a night club act.
He isn’t the brightest crayon in the box. You might also notice that English is a second language for him. Stupid is the first.
‘dro’s favorite past time is to make remarks in his first language. The best thing about his first language is thinking is not even optional, but advertising stupidity is.
# 32 Awake
“One thing that we all can be thankful for: ‘Dubya’ Bush / Rumsfeld / Cheney were not in charge during the Cuban Missile Crisis… the world would be a radiated glowing ember right now had they been in charge…….”
You are so right. Look at how the Bay of Pigs was handled, classic!
#37 Awake
Did you stain your pants?
# 56 Mr. Fusion
“That is called diplomacy and it worked.”
You have no idea what went on over there.
“Carter brought Egypt and Israel together and brought peace to the Middle East.”
The idiot brought some helicopters to the middle east and we were very lucky to get out of that. The whole world showed it’s respect for that stunt didn’t it?
Mr. Fusion,
Thank you for giving me a clue as to what the hell is wrong with Pedro, it’s hard to believe someone can be so dim-witted. It looks like web is in the same camp with him.
I will go as far as to say when you look at the picture of Clinton and Kim Jong Il, the dictator looks happy as a pig in shit to be standing there with him. All the guy probably wants is to be given a little bit of consideration and attention from the rest of the world and a chance to prove he’s not out to blow up the United States like Rumsfeld and Cheaney led everyone to believe. In order to keep the Military-Industrial complex going they NEED to create enemies and when you are labled as an enemy like North Korea was when they were included in the “Axis of Evil” you have no recourse. The war mongers don’t want you to find out the North Korean aren’t the new Nazis cause then they won’t have a reason to bomb them to hell. Whats incredible is that even after all the lies and manipulations that took us to Iraq have been exposed, people still believe this crap.
#60 you are referring to The Attempted Hostage rescue operation in Iran, yes it went bad, and their are reasons for it, and Jimmy Carter will be remmebered for this portion of history, but the man has done so much more. I mentioned his name earlier with Bill Clinton, becasue of who he is and what things he had done, not what went wrong on a dark night in the desert of Iran 30 years ago.
Jimmy Crater did allot of good for the world after his presidency as well. I dont believe we will see the previous admin out building houses for the needy, or being asked to participate in any foriegn relations operations/talks/summits, JC is a Humanitarian, sort of the opposite of what was previously in power. I do not need to say anything else in defending this position, because it has been clarified by several other thoughtful individuals over the past 30 posts.
#61, Watcher,
Whats incredible is that even after all the lies and manipulations that took us to Iraq have been exposed, people still believe this crap.
It gives them a reason to get up every morning.
I slightly disagree about Kim’s potential. He could be very dangerous and as has been said, is paranoid and mentally unstable. Turning the country into a glass landscape might be the best thing that ever happened to the peasants and their miserable, starving, fearful lives. But I don’t advocate it.
#35, I think that you will find the British Government attentpted to make peace with the german Government prior to the Invasion of Poland, and it was only after this did they declare war. Before this Hitler was doing as he pleased and the British Governement was makeing agreements with Hitler. Even after the annexation of Austria in 1938, so Diplomacy was tried first. Churchill was agreat man, and is accomplishments should not be clouded.
Sept 1938… treaty…
Czechoslovakia was informed by Britain and France that it could either resist Germany alone or submit to the prescribed annexations.
I will also add that as an american that has lived overseas (as a civilian and not conected to the military) I know how most countries view the US and its foreign policy(s) and during the Bush Administartion, it was difficult on many levels to speak to foriegn colleagues after the then whithouse actions on a daily basis, so I dont get my opinions from sitting on my couch in kansas. I will say that Clinton and Carter are much more revered for thier actions, than Dubbya…