By: Gov. Bill Richardson, playing a familiar role as a diplomatic troubleshooter, plans to travel to Sudan on Thursday to try to secure the release of American journalist Paul Salopek.
Salopek, a Chicago Tribune reporter who has a home in Columbus, N.M., was arrested last month in the wartorn region of Darfur and charged with espionage, passing information illegally, writing "false news" and entering the African country without a visa.
The governor plans to meet with Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir and ask for the release of Salopek, his driver and interpreter.
Salopek's wife, Linda, will accompany Richardson on the trip to Khartoum, said Pahl Shipley, a spokesman for the governor. Salopek's wife and Chicago Tribune Editor in Chief Ann Marie Lipinski had asked for Richardson's help.
"I will encourage President al-Bashir to recognize the essential role of journalists and a free press and release Paul and his colleagues on humanitarian grounds," Richardson said in a statement on Wednesday.
Richardson, a former congressman, U.N. ambassador and energy secretary during the Clinton administration, secured the release in 1996 of three Red Cross workers, including an Albuquerque pilot, from Marxist rebels in Sudan.
Richardson also has traveled to Iraq, North Korea and Cuba to gain the release of Americans held prisoner. Last year he went to North Korea at the communist government's invitation.
Richardson is strongly favored to win re-election this year and is seen as a possible contender for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2008.
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