Canadian pastor Hyeon Soo Lim, who was detained in February during a humanitarian trip to North Korea, has been sentenced to life in prison for anti-state activities.
Lim was sentenced by North Korea’s Supreme Court, but details of the charges have not been disclosed. Lim appeared at a government-arranged news conference in July during which he confessed to activities aimed at toppling the North Korean government and to violating the country’s Ebola quarantine policy.
China’s state-run Xinhua news agency reported the sentencing in a news flash on Wednesday, but provided no other details. The Associated Press news agency, which has a bureau in Pyongyang, said the sentencing came after a brief trial before the North’s Supreme Court.
Lim, a 60-year-old man of South Korean descent, traveled into North Korea from China on January 30 on a humanitarian trip to support a nursing home, a nursery and an orphanage, according to Lisa Pak, a spokeswoman for the Light Korean Presbyterian Church in Toronto. Lim had visited the reclusive state more than 100 times since 1997.
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