Category: Ling/Lee Incident

Inappropriate snickering will not be tolerated: Laura Ling told CBS News Chief Legal Correspondent Jan Crawford on CBSNews.com’s “Washington Unplugged” last Friday that while imprisoned in North Korea she remembered thinking that she would never be able start a family. But last night, nearly a year removed from her capture, Ling and her husband, Iain Clayton, celebrated the birth of their first child. And according to People Magazine, as a tribute to former president Bill Clinton and his work in...

I’m going to spend the next few days focusing most of my attention on the Cheonan incident and how we ought to respond to it, here are some links on the Ling sisters and their book promotion. You already know my ambivalence about this whole story, but to her credit, Laura Ling hasn’t forgotten why she went to the Tumen River to begin with, and I suppose more people will now hear that story on the Today Show than they...

You know, I was just thinking that it’s been a while since we’ve had a nice flame war over this. The network announced Sunday that Laura Ling and Euna Lee will tell their story in a 30-minute episode that will kick off the fourth season of the documentary series “Vanguard” on May 19. The journalists, both staffers for the series, were held captive by the North Koreans for more than four months after they briefly entered the country by crossing...

Lisa Ling has written to Kushibo, responding to his criticisms. Kushibo, obviously wanting to choose his next words carefully, will respond in the coming days. For the record, I think Kushibo’s fury is motivated by the best of intentions, but I respectfully differ with him on this point. I criticize Lisa Ling for absolutely nothing. Laura Ling, in the course of trying to tell an important story, also with the best of intentions, made a foolish decision to cross into...

In a statement on Thursday, Broadway Books said that Ms. Lee’s memoir, called “The World Is Bigger Now: A Memoir of Faith, Family and Freedom,” would detail “her 140 days of imprisonment, her ongoing interrogation and her efforts to protect her sources and the subjects of her reporting,” as well as the importance of her religious faith during this time. A publication date has not been announced. Ms. Ling is presently pitching her own book with her sister, the journalist...

All emphasis mine: Current TV’s Laura Ling and Euna Lee went to Asia this spring to investigate a chilling situation: the plight of women who cross the border from North Korea into China to escape starvation, only to fall prey to human traffickers. Then, suddenly, the journalists became the story, arrested for stepping into North Korean territory and thrown into jail. [….] “Laura and Euna’s commitment to expose a terrible situation led to their arrest,” says Clothilde Le Coz of...

But they don’t say how the know, what they’re basing that conclusion on, or offer any further details to support that conclusion. The journalists Laura Ling and Euna Lee said in an article in the Los Angeles Times (http:/link.reuters.com/cug44d) that they strayed into North Korean territory in March when visiting a frozen river that marked the border with China. They said they rushed back to the Chinese side but North Korean guards chased them and dragged them into North Korea....

Here are the paragraphs that answer the biggest question — where were they captured? Jodi had heard they were in North Korea. I had heard that they were in China. I’d assumed that we couldn’t both be right, but as it turns out, we both were: When we set out, we had no intention of leaving China, but when our guide beckoned for us to follow him beyond the middle of the river, we did, eventually arriving at the riverbank...

I don’t believe I can count all the layers of ambivalence I feel about this. Hat tip to a reader.

Over at Pajamas Media, investigative reporting legend Claudia Rosett — she broke the oil-for-food scandal — has a proposal for Laura Ling and Euna Lee’s book/movie rights, which I heartily endorse: Though in light of the talk now circulating about a payola of book and movie deals, I have another suggestion. It would be entirely fitting for Laura Ling and Euna Lee to donate whatever money they make from their  story to some of the private charitable organizations whose staff...

[Updated below] Now that Laura Ling and Euna Lee are on their way home, I have a short list of things I do and do not want to hear from them, starting with any retch-inducing drivel about how well they were treated while they shouldn’t have been in captivity at all. Let’s make that the first thing on our list: 1.  Please spare us the Stockholm Syndrome at LAX.  Try to remember that you weren’t in North Korea to rob...