A human rights activist, is believed to be detained in the authoritarian state of North Korea, as per the colleagues of the individual. Robert Park, 28, managed to make his way into North Korea from China by slipping frozen Tumen River and was on a mission to shed more light on the worsening human rights in the country. The activist made his way into the country on Christmas and no one has heard from him since, sparking the fear of his arrest by the North Korean authorities.

However, according to many analysts, Pyongyang is most likely to expel the human rights activist rather than prosecuting him, as a punishment would only bring more focus to the subject for which Mr. Park took the risk. As of there has been no word from Pyongyang and the U.S. Embassy in Beijing as well as U.S. State Department have stated that, they are privy to the incident, but have no further details into the case or to condition of Robert Park.

According to Pax Koreana (Human Rights Group),

“We haven’t heard anything about him since he went there. But it’s North Korea. We presume he has been arrested there.”

The highly paranoid communist regime of North Korea could feel threatened by this incident and it also a possibility that, it could take this incident as an excuse to stall Washington’s efforts of bringing Pyongyang to the negotiation table aimed at ending the country’s nuclear program. This latest incident comes just months after two U.S journalists were released by North Korean authorities, after an intervention by the former U.S President, Bill Clinton. The two journalists had been convicted of trespassing and “hostile acts” and under the North Korean law, were sentenced to 12 years of hard prison labor.

Via Associated Press.