Journos Freed by North Korea Return to U.S.

By: Two American journalists freed by North Korea have returned home to the United States on a flight with former President Bill Clinton.

The jet carrying Euna Lee and Laura Ling landed at Burbank's Bob Hope Airport early this morning. The women spent more than four months detained in North Korea.

The reporters were granted a pardon by North Korea on Tuesday, following rare talks between Clinton and the reclusive leader Kim Jong Il. They had been sentenced to 12 years of hard labor for entering the country illegally.

In exclusive APTN video showing their release, the women were shown dressed in short-sleeved shirts and jeans as they boarded the plane in North Korea.

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton hailed their release.

"I spoke to my husband on the airplane and everything went well," she told reporters in Nairobi, Kenya.

Ling's father, Doug, told reporters outside his home in Carmichael, Calif., that his daughter's release was one of the best days of his life. He said he would travel to the Burbank airport to meet his daughter's plane early this morning, and planned to bring American flags, yellow ribbons and banners to welcome her home.

"I'm going to go down there and see my little girl," he said.

Ling, a 32-year-old California native, is the younger sister of Lisa Ling, a correspondent for CNN as well as The Oprah Winfrey Show and National Geographic Explorer. Lee, 36, a South Korean-born U.S. citizen, is the mother of a 4-year-old.

It was a jubilant conclusion to a more than four-month ordeal for the women, who were arrested near the North Korean-Chinese border in March while on a reporting trip for Current TV, the media venture founded by former Vice President Al Gore.

Gore was expected to be at the Burbank airport to greet the women, who were sentenced in June for illegal entry and engaging in "hostile acts."

Hillary Clinton had urged North Korea last month to grant them amnesty, saying they were remorseful and their families anguished.

The release also amounted to a successful diplomatic foray for the former president, who traveled as an unofficial envoy, with approval and coordination from the administration. He was uniquely positioned for it as the only recent president who had considered visiting North Korea while in office, and one who had sent his secretary of state, Madeleine Albright.

But the backchannel genesis of the mission was not immediately clear, whether Obama called on him, North Korea asked for him or his wife suggested him.

His landmark visit to Pyongyang to free the Americans was a coup that came at a time of heightened tensions over North Korea's nuclear program.

Hillary Clinton also rejected an official report by the North Korean news agency that said Bill Clinton had delivered an apology about the incident to the country's ailing leader.

"That is not true," she said. "That did not occur."

A senior U.S. official said the reporters' families and Gore asked the former president to travel to Pyongyang to seek their release and that Clinton's mission did not include discussions about issues beyond that. The official spoke on condition of anonymity to describe events leading up to the Clinton trip and the women's release.

The meeting also appeared aimed at dispelling persistent questions about the health of the authoritarian North Korean leader, who was said to be suffering from chronic diabetes and heart disease before the reported stroke. The meeting was Kim's first with a prominent Western figure since the reported stroke.

Kim smiled broadly for a photo standing next to a towering Clinton. He was markedly thinner than a year ago, with his graying hair cropped short. The once-pudgy 67-year-old, who for decades had a noticeable pot belly, wore a khaki jumpsuit and appeared frail and diminutive in a group shot seated next to a robust Clinton.