North Korea announcing Friday it is holding Otto Fredierick Warmbier prisoner for what it calls a “hostile act” against the government.
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According to the Associated Press, North Korea says it has a University of Virginia student in custody. A Dayton-area man, Jeffrey Fowle, was held for almost six months in 2014. The date of his arrest for allegedly “perpetrating a hostile act” wasn’t clear, nor were any details of what he did.
Warmbier is the second American now held hostage in North Korea.
An American student has been detained by North Korean officials in Pyongyang, according to Young Pioneer Tours, the company with whom the student was traveling.
Warmbier’s profiles on social media show that he’s majoring in economics and minoring in global sustainability and that he’s previously traveled to Cuba, Israel and Ireland. A Theta Chi fraternity brother, Miles Kirwin, added, “He’s an incredible guy”.
Warmbier was a top student at his high school in a northern Cincinnati suburb and was described as a skilled soccer player.
An attorney who represented Fowle in 2014 advised caution for those involved with the student.
In December, a South Korean-born Canadian pastor, the Rev. Lim Hyeon-soo, who was sentenced in December to life in prison with hard labor on charges that included using religion to try to destroy North Korea’s system of government. “You have to be careful what you say”.
Fowle was detained after leaving a Bible he said he hoped would get to “underground” Christians. Some foreigners previously arrested have read statements of guilt that they later said were coerced.
Yun Byung-Se, the South’s foreign minister, was quoted by Forbes as having said that unless the North gets the message that there will be a price to pay for their nuclear weapons tests, the possibility that the hermit country will conduct “a fifth or sixth test” can not be ruled out.
“We are in touch with Otto’s family, the U.S. State Department and the Embassy of Sweden in Pyongyang and doing all we can to secure his release”.
“The welfare of US citizens is one of the department’s highest priorities”, US State Department spokesman John Kirby said in Davos, Switzerland.
The State Department advises all USA citizens not to travel to North Korea.
The United States had little leverage with North Korea, which has an embassy in New York City, Hall said.
Only the 15-member Security Council can refer the situation in North Korea to the ICC, but diplomats say China, North Korea’s main benefactor, would likely veto such a move.
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South Korea warned that the United States and its allies were working on further sanctions to inflict “bone-numbing pain” on North Korea after its latest nuclear test, and urged China to do its part to rein in its neighbor.
