Reports: American tourist detained in North Korea

Photos of orphans may be the reason behind one man’s detention

By NBC News staff and wire reports

SEOUL -- An American tourist who visited North Korea last month for what was to have been a five-day trip has been detained by police there, associates of his family and activists in Seoul said.

Kenneth Bae, 44, was in a group of five tourists who visited the northeast city of Rajin, South Korea's Yonhap news agency said, citing a report by the Kookmin Ilbo newspaper. Bae, who is Korean-American, entered North Korea on Nov. 3.

"What we know is that he is a person who wants to help poor children, kotjebis (homeless children), and he took pictures of them to support them later," said Do Hee-youn, a North Korean human rights activist and head of the Citizens' Coalition for Human Rights of Abductees and North Korean Refugees.

'Fluttering swallows'There are said to be thousands of homeless, starving children in the North after a famine in the 1990s. Kotjebis translates into English as "fluttering swallows."

It was impossible for NBC News to confirm Bae's arrest in one of the world's most secretive states and there has been no formal announcement on North Korean media. More on NBC >>
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