Two female American journalists face five years or more in a labour camp, after North Korea announced yesterday that they would be prosecuted for allegedly crossing the Stalinist state’s border with China.

Euna Lee and Laura Ling of the web-based channel, Current TV, were arrested in mid-March while reporting from the Tumen River, which marks the North Korea’s north-east border. They were investigating the plight of North Korean refugees and appear either to have crossed the border or been abducted from the Chinese side by Chinese soldiers

Either way, they have now become pawns in a much larger international diplomatic game which has seen the North Korean leader, Kim Jong Il, defy the world by testing a long range nuclear missile and building a small arsenal of nuclear weapons.

After being held for five weeks in a North Korean state guest house, the two are now been formally prosecuted on unknown charges, possible espionage or “hostility toward North Koreans”, which carry a sentence of between five and ten years.

“A competent organ of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea concluded the investigation into the journalists of the United States,” the state run Korean Central News Agency reported yesterday. “The organ formally decided to refer them to a trial on the basis of the confirmed crimes committed by them.”

The US has no diplomatic relations with North Korea, and it has relied on the Swedish Embassy in Pyongyang to act as its intermediary. A Swedish diplomat has met the two captives, but the US government has only said that it is doing its best to free them, apparently hoping that the matter can be resolved quietly without the need to turn it into an international incident

Current TV, which was founded by the former US vice-president, Al Gore, has made no statement about the detention of its employees, and took down a report about their capture from its website.

Ms Ling, 32, is a Chinese-American and vice-president of the young, informal channel’s investigative reporting unit, based in Hollywood. Euna Lee is a Korean-American videographer. The two were also accompanied by Mitch Koss, a cameraman who escaped capture and is now back in the US

A Christian pastor in South Korea, who introduced them to defectors living in Chinese border towns, says that he warned them to stay clear of the river border itself, which is easily crossed when it is frozen or at a low ebb.

A South Korean news agency reported that they had crossed the river and then ignored warnings to stop shooting footage inside North Korea. Another report claimed that they were arrested as they ran back across the river, alleging that they were pursued by soldiers into China.

A handful of foreigners have got into trouble by entering North Korea by unapproved routes. A US Army sergeant named Charles Jenkins who deserted on impulse in 1965 immediately regretted it. He married an abducted Japanese woman and they were eventually allowed to leave for Japan with their two children.

An American army helicopter pilot accidentally strayed from South to North Korea in 1994; after signing an apology he was released after just 13 days. The last American to enter uninvited was Evan Carl Hunziker, who swam across the river dividing the country from China while drunk and remained there for three months. He was only released after the then US Congressman, Bill Richardson, travelled to North Korea with a 5,000 dollar “accommodation fee”. Mr Hunziker shot himself dead a month later after falling into depression.

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