David Sneddon, missing since 2004 kidnapped by Kim Jong-un,Korea

dotr said:

In other countries would the crime be considered public mischief, or theft, wondering what the usual punishment would be ?

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...ives-home-Ohio-North-Korea.html#ixzz4jzbc4KQV
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[video=youtube;N8qZRyIWTf4]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N8qZRyIWTf4[/video]

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neesaki said:

Does Otto not have his own thread? I can't find one. TIA

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dotr said:

Just started one.Hopefully the posts already here concerning Otto, will help bring attention to David Sneddon.
http://www.websleuths.com/forums/showthread.php?340717-Otto-Warmbier-22-U-of-V-student-released-from-North-Korea-June-17&p=13438652#post13438652

Otto Warmbier,22, U of V student,released from North Korea, June/17

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24-year-old David Sneddon went missing in August, 2004 from Yunnan Province, China, near an area called the Tiger Leaping Gorge. David had been studying in Beijing, and was traveling around Southern China before returning home. In this episode, part one of a two-part series, we speak with both George Bailey, the last person who knew him to see him before he disappeared, and his brother, James, who travelled to China to hike the trail in search of his lost brother.

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In Part 2 of our coverage of David Sneddon, a 24 year old American student who went missing in Yunnan Province, China in 2004, we discuss the evidence that David Sneddon was abducted by North Korea. We return to our conversations with David’s brother, James, and David’s former roommate in China, George Bailey. We also speak to Greg Scarlatoiu, the Executive Director of The Committee for Human Rights in North Korea, Robert Boynton, author of The Invitation Only Zone: North Korea’s Abduction Project, and Congressman Chris Stewart from Utah.

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Gardener1850 said:

North Korea’s other Otto: The unbelievable story of missing hiker David Sneddon


http://www.news.com.au/lifestyle/re...g-hiker-david-sneddon/news-story/90ab2549acaf

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The idea sounds implausible, but that’s North Korea. On the other end of the line was Chuck Downs, deputy director at the Pentagon’s East Asia office and a human rights committee director. He laid it out for the shellshocked Sneddon family.

North Korea has been kidnapping foreigners for more than half a century to assist in training intelligence officers — thousands from South Korea, along with several hundred from Japan and China and a handful from other nations around Europe, Asia and the Middle East.

Yunnan province is known as an “underground railroad” for North Korean refugees, a network of safe houses and routes through which defectors are smuggled from China into Southeast Asia, aided by Christian activists from the West. Downs suspected David could have been mistaken for one of these smugglers by agents operating on the routes, but as time passed and the Sneddons dug into the possibility further, a more sinister theory emerged.

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David’s exceptional language skills from teaching in South Korea would have made him a valuable individual for Kim Jong-il, who had been kidnapping foreign linguists to train his spies since the 1970s.

The law and languages student spoke both Mandarin and Korean, and his disappearance came just months before regime was due to release US Army Sergeant Charles Jenkins, after 40 years in captivity serving as an English teacher. Jenkins, who was interrogated for 10 days before he was transferred to a fortress-like house with two other Americans where he was captive for decades, later wrote: “I suffered from enough cold, hunger, beatings, and mental torture to frequently make me wish I was dead.”

The head of an NGO told the Sneddons they suspected the regime may have taken David as a replacement for Jenkins, to teach English to the regime’s senior diplomats, spies, or even future leader Kim Jong-un.

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Roy believes Otto’s father is maintaining a “strategic silence”, and is “working quietly behind the scenes.”

David is not on the list of American detainees who US secretary of state Rex Tillerson is demanding North Korea release, but Senator Mike Lee and Congressman Chris Stewart have been campaigning for their cause for years. The family believe anger over Otto’s case may offer an opportunity for them, which they are determined to grab with both hands.
“You’re watching the next step,” says Roy. “We’re right in it, right now. How it turns out, I do not know.”

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‘IF KIM DIDN’T LIKE DAVID ANYMORE, HE’D BE KILLED’

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[h=1]The Current[/h] [h=2]with Anna Maria Tremonti[/h]

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It wasn't until seven years later that someone approached the Sneddon family with an alternative theory: David had been abducted by North Korean agents, and he might still be alive in North Korea.

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David Sneddon's parents, Roy and Kathleen, at their home in Logan, Utah. (Sam Colbert/CBC)


"I just thought it was the most ridiculous thing I'd ever heard," David's mother Kathleen Sneddon tells the CBC's Sam Colbert at her home in Logan, Utah.

'If you know the history of North Korea's kidnappings of foreign nationals, it's not so crazy.' - Melanie Kirkpatrick, expert on North Korea​

"The first time I tell people about David Sneddon, that's close to what I hear — 'That's preposterous,'" says Melanie Kirkpatrick, a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute and an expert on North Korea.
"But if you know the history of North Korea's kidnappings of foreign nationals, it's not so crazy."

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David Sneddon’s backpack was found at a guesthouse after he disappeared in China. This photo was from a reel of undeveloped film found in the backpack of David during his trip through Yunnan province. (The Sneddon Family)


Experts have a number of theories on why David might have been targeted. And since the Sneddons first heard of that possibility, they've been approached by groups in Japan and South Korea, who say they've gotten reports from inside North Korea that David is alive and well there.

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blacktym said:

Bump because of the new Thin Air podcast episode about David:
https://play.google.com/music/m/D67...de_22_-_David_Sneddon_Part_1-Thin_Air_Podcast

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neesaki said:

They said they found his backpack in the guesthouse. If he had gone hiking wouldn't he have had that with him?

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