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North Korea 'holds US reporters' North Korea 'holds US reporters'
(about 2 hours later)
North Korean soldiers have detained at least one Korean-American journalist near the North's border with China, South Korean media say. North Korean soldiers have detained two female US journalists, according to media reports.
YTN TV channel quotes a South Korean official as saying two reporters were held after being asked to stop filming. The reporters were arrested on Tuesday near a river on North Korea's border with China, according to South Korean TV and newspaper reports.
Other reports say one female journalist was arrested. The journalists had apparently ignored warnings to stop filming in the area.
It is not yet clear who the journalists were working for. The reports come amid heightened tension between the US and North Korea. The reports come amid heightened tensions between North Korea and the US over the North's plans to launch a satellite into space.
The North has angered the US by planning a missile launch for April as part of its satellite communications programme. The North says the launch is part of its communications programme, but the US fears this is a cover for testing long-range missile technology.
The US believes the launch is intended to test a rocket that could potentially carry a warhead as far as US territory. Crossing point
South Korean media has so far given conflicting details of the arrest. There is still some confusion as to exactly where the reporters were arrested.
A report in the Munwha Ilbo newspaper says a female reporter from the US was detained in the Yalu river area dividing China and North Korea. South Korean television station YTN and unnamed diplomatic sources said that North Korean guards crossed the Tumen river into Chinese territory to arrest the two journalists.
Meanwhile, YTN reported that North Korean guards crossed into Chinese territory to make two arrests near the Tumen River. Munhwa Ilbo newspaper reported the arrest of just one US journalist, and said the incident took place along another border river, the Yalu. The two areas are hundreds of miles apart.
The two areas are hundreds of miles apart. Both the Tumen and Yalu rivers are frequent crossing points for trade between China and North Korea.
There has been no official comment so far from either Pyongyang or Washington. Many North Koreans also try to cross the rivers, to escape into China through the porous border - fleeing poverty and repression in their homeland, and attracted by the economic boom in China.
The BBC's Michael Bristow, who has just returned from the North Korea-China border, says there is a heavy military presence in the area.
There are checkpoints every few kilometres, he says, with both Chinese and North Korean soldiers visible from the river banks.
Rising tensions
Tensions between North Korea and the international community - particularly the US - have heightened since North Korea's announcement that it will launch a communications satellite between 4 and 8 April.
Millions of people are thought to be in need of food aidAnalysts believe the satellite launch is actually a planned long-range missile test, and the US and its allies have called for it to be cancelled.
Pyongyang recently put its military on full combat alert and shut its border with the South, leaving 400 South Korean workers in the shared Kaesong industrial zone stranded.
On Tuesday the US said North Korea had refused to accept any further food aid supplies, despite the fact the World Food Programme recently estimated that nine million people were in need of food assistance.
Five aid groups have been told to leave the North by the end of March, the US state department said.