Kim Jong Il the Spaceman

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Human rights organizations, including the United Nations Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Democratic Republic of Korea, are repeatedly denied access to North Korea, which is notoriously reclusive yet provocative. The state-run news outlet, North Korea's Central News Agency (KCNA), is not only North Korea's only news outlet but is also (unsurprisingly) censored and nationalistic. Far from critiquing the government it speaks only in awe of it, giving it its absolute support and admiration. Consider its reporting on the 'Trial of American Journalists' who illegally entered North Korea this summer, "Clinton expressed words of sincere apology to Kim Jong Il for the hostile acts committed by the two American journalists against the DPRK after illegally intruding into it."

As a result of its closed- doors policy, the international community, NGOs, and news stations have been forced to make things up about the country of secrets that is North Korea. The Onion has been especially successful at this:

The Right to Write

North Korean Journalists in Prison

By Ashley Gutierrez

As a student journalist, for me this is both terrifying and appalling. The US administration must insist on Laura Ling and Euna Lee’s release from prison and North Korea.

Arguments have countered that Ling and Lee deserve this - that it is the price they should pay for going after a story that they wanted for fame, that they should have known what they were getting themselves into. Not all journalists are in the field for fame. Journalists put themselves at risk for stories all the time to allow us, the public, to learn the truth. It is our right to know, and it is their right to write- to speak.

North Korea must release these journalists on humanitarian grounds.