Prisoner of War

North Korea loves to bark out threats, upside-down history lessons and untenable orders via the megaphone-media-mouthpiece known as the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA). It especially loves to do so on, or around, significant anniversary dates. The minions of KCNA most likely have a tattered, annotated Almanac to go along with those old 1960s Korean-English dictionaries that they seem to rely upon for their day-late missive translations.

Filed under: Aijalon Mahli Gomes, Movie Madness

The Forgotten Detainee

This weekend will mark the 140th day of North Korean captivity for Boston do-gooder Aijalon Mahli Gomes, who crossed into the country illegally on January 25th, 2010. Like Laura Ling and Euna Lee, he is “somewhere inside”; like the two journalists, he was subjected to a sham trial and handed down a ridiculous sentence, in his case eight years of hard labor and more than $700,000 U.S. in “fines.” But unlike Ling and Lee, who found freedom on their 140th day of detainment, hardly anyone has been talking about Gomes.

Filed under: Aijalon Mahli Gomes

The Second Disappearance of Robert Park

The last bit of real news about recent North Korean detainee Robert Park (December 25th, 2009 to February 5th, 2010) was a gruesome tidbit included in a March 8th report in The National newspaper by the always reliable Sunny Lee. Up until that point, rumors of Park having suffered some sort of sexual abuse or torture had focused on speculation that the actions were of a homosexual nature, but Seoul-based attorney and activist Jo Sung-rae painted a very different, no less horrifying picture.

Filed under: Aijalon Mahli Gomes, Robert Park

Third Time’s the Curse

Although there is good news of a sort today involving Boston-bred English teacher Aijalon Mahli Gomes, who was sentenced by North Korea on April 7th to eight years of hard labor and more than $700,000 U.S. in fines for illegally crossing into the country on January 25th, 2010, a small group of supporters continue to wonder why there has not been more of an outcry about his situation and a rallying of support. The main reason comes down, quite simply, to the timing of his actions.

Filed under: Aijalon Mahli Gomes, Robert Park