US detainee \'leaves North Korea\'

Official Chinese news agency Xinhua said that a team from the US State Department had flown out of communist North Korea, led by Robert King, US special envoy for Human Rights and Humanitarian Issues.

"A US citizen named Eddie Jun Yong-Su, who was detained last November, was also on the plane heading back to the United States with the delegation," Xinhua said.

King and Jun arrived at Beijing on Saturday morning aboard a flight of Air Koryo, the North\'s state airline, but Jun did not appear at the arrival gate with the envoy, South Korea\'s Yonhap news agency said.

"We are very happy to report that Mr Jun, the American citizen being held in Pyongyang, has been released," Yonhap quoted King as saying on arrival in Beijing.

"We are also delighted that in a day or two he will be back with his wife and family."

Earlier, Pyongyang\'s official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) said King and his entourage had left North Korea by air.

But it did not say whether the delegation had taken Jun, a California-based businessman, who had been detained for apparent missionary activities in the hardline communist state.

King\'s departure came a day after North Korea said it had decided to free and return Jun "on humanitarian grounds in consideration of repeated requests" by recent US visitors to Pyongyang, including King.

King was at the head of a team to assess whether to resume US food aid to the hungry state. UN agencies say that six million people urgently need assistance.

Mark Toner, a State Department spokesman, told reporters in Washington on Friday that Jun, whom King visited on Thursday, appeared to be in "decent health".

KCNA said the North was also influenced by appeals from former US president Jimmy Carter and evangelist Franklin Graham, who both visited the country in recent weeks and sought clemency for Jun.

An investigation found that Jun had committed a "grave crime" which he had frankly admitted, KCNA said.

Lim Chang-Ho, a professor at a South Korean theological college, said earlier this month that Jun had engaged in "aggressive" missionary activities in the North.

It was the third case in less than a year of an apparent US Christian activist being detained by Pyongyang.

Missionary Robert Park was held on Christmas Day 2009 after walking across the border to make a one-man protest over human rights violations. He was freed in February 2010 after the North said he expressed "sincere repentance".

On January 25, 2010, the North detained Aijalon Mahli Gomes for crossing the border illegally and sentenced him to eight years\' hard labour.

Gomes was said to be a devout Christian. He was freed last August after Carter flew to Pyongyang to intercede.

The North\'s constitution guarantees freedom of religious belief, but in practice, "genuine religious freedom did not exist", according to the US State Department\'s latest human rights report.

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