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Bill Clinton meets with North Korean leader Kim Jong Il

THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

Published: August 4, 2009

SEOUL, South Korea
Former President Bill Clinton met Tuesday with North Korean leader Kim Jong Il on the first day of a surprise visit to Pyongyang, with the "exhaustive" talks covering a wide range of topics, state-run media said.

Clinton "courteously" conveyed a verbal message from President Barack Obama, the official Korean Central News Agency said in a report from Pyongyang. Kim expressed his thanks, and engaged Clinton in a "wide-ranging exchange of views on matters of common concern," the report said.

Clinton was in communist North Korea on a mission to secure the release of Americans Euna Lee and Laura Ling, reporters for former Vice President Al Gore's Current TV media venture who were arrested along the Chinese-North Korean border in March and sentenced in June to 12 years of hard labor for illegal entry and engaging in "hostile acts."

His visit, which was not announced in advance by North Korea or the U.S., comes at a time of heightened tensions between Washington and Pyongyang over the regime's nuclear program.

North Korea in recent months has conducted a nuclear test and test-fired an array of ballistic missiles in violation of U.N. Security Council resolutions, with Washington leading the push to punish Pyongyang for its defiance.

The meeting with Kim would be the North Korean leader's first with a prominent Western figure since he reportedly suffered a stroke a year ago.

There was no word in state media on the status of Clinton's negotiations to secure the release of Ling, 32, and Lee, 36.

A senior U.S. official confirmed to reporters traveling to Africa with U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton that the former president was in North Korea to secure their release, but said the White House would not comment until the mission was complete.

"While this solely private mission to secure the release of two Americans is on the ground, we will have no comment," White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said in a statement. "We do not want to jeopardize the success of former President Clinton's mission."