N. Korea to Put American Journalists on Trial

TOKYO, March 31 -- Two American journalists detained this month by North Korean soldiers will be put on trial for "hostile acts" and illegal entry, North Korea's official news agency reported Tuesday.

The Americans appear to have become negotiating cards in an international conflict over the planned launch early next month of a long-range missile. Japan, South Korea and the United States have called the launch a provocation and have said they may seek to toughen U.N. sanctions against the North.

Laura Ling and Euna Lee, reporters working for Al Gore's San Francisco-based Current TV, were seized March 17 along North Korea's border with China. The two reporters walked across the shallow Tumen River into North Korea, where they were detained, South Korean intelligence sources told a Seoul newspaper last week.

"The illegal entry of U.S. reporters into the DPRK and their suspected hostile acts have been confirmed by evidence and their statements," the news agency said. It said the government is "making a preparation for indicting them at a trial on the basis of the already confirmed suspicions."

In Washington, a State Department spokesman said Monday that a Swedish diplomat had been granted access to the American journalists over the weekend. The United States does not have diplomatic relations with North Korea, and the Swedish embassy in Pyongyang sometimes helps U.S. citizens there.

North Korea said in a statement Tuesday that "while the investigation is under way, consular contact is allowed and the treatment of the U.S. reporters [will be allowed] according to the relevant international laws."

North Korea did not say what hostile acts the two reporters were accused of committing. A report last week in JoongAng Ilbo, a newspaper in Seoul, quoted South Korean intelligence source saying that they were being interrogated for alleged espionage.

In the 1990s, at least three Americans were held in North Korea for extended periods after accidentally crossing into the country. All three were eventually released after negotiations.

Several analysts in Seoul said the North Korean government would use the detention of the American journalists as a bargaining chip to put pressure on the United States to soften its complaints about the planned missile launch, scheduled to occur between April 4 and 8.

North Korea says it will send a communications satellite into orbit, but the United States, Japan and South Korea have said that claim is a fig leaf for testing a new ballistic missile that may be able to hit the western United States.

Over the weekend, Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates said the United States has no plans to stop North Korea from launching its missiles or to shoot it down, unless it threatens U.S. territory. South Korea also opposes military intervention and Japan has said it will shoot down the missile only if it fails and its debris appears likely to imperil Japanese territory.