“That’s not true,” White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said when asked about the reports by North Korean state media on Clinton’s surprise mission to win the release of two imprisoned U.S. journalists.
Earlier, official reports in the communist st
ate said Clinton met North Korean leader Kim Jong-Il in Pyongyang and delivered a message from Obama.
“Bill Clinton courteously conveyed a verbal message of U.S. President Barack Obama to Kim Jong-Il,” the official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) reported.
Clinton arrived in Pyongyang earlier in the day on what the White House called a private mission to seek the release of the jailed female journalists.
“While this solely private mission to secure the release of two Americans is on the ground, we will have no comment,” White House press secretary Robert Gibbs said in a brief written statement.
“We do not want to jeopardize the success of former president Clinton’s mission.”
Clinton’s surprise trip, which comes after months of tensions between the U.S. and Pyongyang over the North’s weapons of mass destruction programs, was the highest-profile visit by an American to Pyongyang for nearly a decade.
From early in his 2008 campaign, Obama vowed to engage U.S. foes including North Korea. Since his inauguration in January, however, North Korea has become even more belligerent with a nuclear test and a string of missile launches.
Journalists Laura Ling and Euna Lee were arrested on March 17 while reporting on refugees fleeing the impoverished North.
A court in June sentenced them to 12 years of “reform through labour” for illegal entry and other offenses.
