Mick Hartley

It's strange that we haven't heard more about the two American journalists detained by the North Koreans:

The reporters arrested on Tuesday have been named in news reports as Laura Ling, a Chinese-American, and Euna Lee, a Korean-American.

Both reportedly work for the California-based online media outlet Current TV.

A Chinese interpreter accompanying the two journalists was also arrested.

Chun Ki-won, a Christian clergyman in Seoul who helped arrange the journalists' trip, has said they went to the area to report on North Korean refugees in north-eastern China.

There have been conflicting reports about where the women were detained. South Korean reports have suggested they were on Chinese territory.

But North Korea's official Central News Agency said the journalists were detained on Tuesday "while illegally intruding into the territory of the DPRK [North Korea]".

"A competent organ is now investigating the case," it added.

It's surely unlikely in the extreme that the reporters would have been so foolish as to actually cross over the Tumen river into DPRK territory. And when was the Central News Agency ever a reliable source? The most plausible explanation is, as the Guardian reported, that the women were on Chinese territory when they were detained: 

South Korean television channel YTV said guards from the North crossed the border into Chinese territory to arrest two US journalists, quoting an official in Seoul.

It said the two women, described as Korean-American employees of a California-based online news company, had ignored warnings to stop filming across the Tumen river.

The Munhwa Ilbo evening newspaper said guards had detained one US journalist near the Yalu river, along the western part of the border between the two countries, which runs into the Tumen river on the east side.

Which is to say, they were kidnapped.

No doubt there are all kinds of negotiations going on behind the scenes, but this is, surely, a major news story – and potentially an embarrassment for the Chinese.