Jimmy Carter rushes to Pyongyang

US President in 1977-1981 Jimmy Carter flies to Pyongyang to rescue 30-year-old compatriot Aijalon Mali Gomez from a North Korean prison. However, “no other topics will be discussed,” said the Washington weekly Foreign Policy, as well as two State Department officials. The latter, on condition of anonymity, said that 85-year-old Carter will travel to North Korea unaccompanied by officials and hopes to return to the United States with Gomez tomorrow.

The United States and North Korea do not have diplomatic relations. Gomez, an English teacher in South Korea, was arrested in January for illegally crossing into North Korea from China. In April, he was sentenced to eight years of correctional labor and a $700,000 fine. In July, he attempted suicide, and in early August, a State Department team of four diplomats unsuccessfully tried to negotiate his release in Pyongyang.

A year ago, former Democratic President Bill Clinton resolved a similar problem with two American journalists in Pyongyang at a meeting with North Korean leader Kim Jong Il. In 1994, Carter's negotiations with then-North Korean leader Kim Il Sung on behalf of Clinton led to the signing of a framework agreement on the gradual normalization of bilateral relations, but in 2002, Republican President George W. Bush abandoned it. In the field of nuclear disarmament in North Korea, Carter considers the current US sanctions against it “counterproductive.”

Alexey SLOBODIN