Freed from North Korea, U.S. journalists return home

By Steve Gorman and Dan Whitcomb

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Two American journalists freed by North Korea tearfully reunited with their families in the United States on Wednesday while Washington tried to play down talk of a breakthrough with Pyongyang.

Laura Ling, 32, and Euna Lee, 36, reporters for an American cable television venture arrived at Burbank airport near Los Angles aboard a private jet with former President Bill Clinton, who secured their release after meeting over dinner with North Korea's reclusive and ailing leader, Kim Jong-il.

President Barack Obama said he was "extraordinarily relieved" at the women's return but insisted the way for North Korea to improve relations with the United States was to give up nuclear weapons and stop its belligerent behavior.

Clinton's dramatic visit was the first high-level U.S. contact with North Korea in nearly a decade.

Despite the mission's success, the drama underlined the fine line Washington treads to avoid rewarding Pyongyang after repeated military provocations while trying to coax it into giving up its ambitions of becoming a nuclear-weapons power.

Critics of North Korea, including Republican Senator John McCain, accused Kim of using Clinton's visit to enhance his position amid doubts about his health.

They urged the Obama administration not to sidestep six-nation negotiations by engaging in direct bilateral talks with North Korea on ending its nuclear weapons program, a move that worries U.S. allies South Korea and Japan.

North Korea quit the on-and-off negotiations last year and has since insisted it will only talk with Washington.

Ling thrust her arms in the air as the two beaming women descended from the plane to an emotional reunion with their families in an airport hangar. Lee hugged Hana, the 4-year-old daughter she had not seen for five months.

HARD LABOR

Ling said they both feared they could be taken to a hard labor camp when they were led instead on Tuesday to a location where Clinton was waiting for them.

"We knew instantly in our hearts that the nightmare of our lives was finally coming to an end. Now we stand here home and free," she told reporters.

The two journalists, who work for Current TV, co-founded by Clinton's vice president, Al Gore, were arrested on March 17 for illegally crossing into North Korea from China and had been reporting on the trafficking of women. They were both sentenced to 12 years of hard labor in June.

Clinton did not speak on arrival, but said in a statement that the women's families, Gore and the White House had asked him to undertake the humanitarian mission to Pyongyang.

The former president, who tried unsuccessfully to halt North Korea's nuclear arms program in the 1990s, spoke briefly with Obama by telephone and will brief national security officials on his meeting with Kim, the White House said.