US man in N Korea 'back in labour camp'
AP February 8, 2014, 11:11 am
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US citizen Kenneth Bae has been returned to a North Korean labour camp, his family says. AP
A US citizen detained in North Korea for 15 months has been returned to a labour camp, prompting worries about his health.
Kenneth Bae, who led tour groups in North Korea, was arrested in late 2012 and sentenced to 15 years hard labour for unspecified hostile acts.
After he lost 22 kilograms, he was moved in 2013 to a hospital from a prison work camp where he had been farming vegetables.
His sister, Terri Chung, said her family learnt from the US State Department on Friday that Bae was taken back to the camp on January 20.
"He's back to eight-hours-a-day, six-days-a-week hard labour," she said.
"We can't help but be concerned about that."
The news coincided with the release of a story in a pro-Pyongyang newspaper based in Japan, Choson Sinbo, reporting that a US envoy was expected to visit Bae by the end of the month.
State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki did not comment directly on the report, but she reiterated the US had made a longstanding offer to send its envoy on North Korean human rights issues, Robert King.
Bae, a 45-year-old father of three, was born in South Korea and migrated to the US with his parents and sister in 1985.
He had been living in China as a Christian missionary for about seven years before his arrest. In the past few years, he began leading small tour groups, mostly of US and Canadian citizens, into a "special economic zone" designed to encourage commerce in northeastern North Korea.
The State Department and Vice-President Joe Biden have requested his release, and on Thursday President Barack Obama echoed those calls at the annual National Prayer Breakfast in Washington, DC.
"We pray for Kenneth Bae, a Christian missionary who has been held in North Korea for 15 months," he said.
"His family wants him home, and the United States will continue to do everything in our power to secure his release because Kenneth Bae deserves to be free."
