American freed from N. Korea dies at 22
CINCINNATI — Otto Warmbier, an American college student who was released by North Korea in a coma last week after almost a year and a half in captivity, died Monday, his family said.
The 22- year- old “has completed his journey home,” relatives said in a statement. They did not cite a specific cause of death.
“Unfortunately, the awful, torturous mistreatment our son received at the hands of the North Koreans ensured that no other
outcome was possible beyond the sad one we experienced today,” his parents said.
Several U. S. officials and lawmakers offered their support for the Warmbiers while condemning North Korea’s government, which President Donald Trump called a “brutal regime.”
Doctors had described Otto Warmbier’s condition as a state of “unresponsive wakefulness” and said he suffered a “severe neurological injury” of unknown cause.
Fred Warmbier said last week that he believed his son had been fighting for months to stay alive to return to his family. The family’s statement Monday said the younger Warmbier looked uncomfortable and anguished after arriving June 13, but that his countenance later changed.
“He was peace. He was home, and we believe he could sense that,” they said.
Warmbier was convicted of subversion for allegedly trying to steal a North Korean propaganda banner while visiting with a tour group. He was put before North Korean officials and journalists for a televised “confession.”
“I have made the worst mistake of my life,” he exclaimed, choking up as he begged to be allowed to reunite with his parents and two younger siblings. He was sentenced to 15 years in prison with hard labor.
The University of Virginia student from Wyoming, Ohio, was held for more than 17 months. His family said they were told that he had been in a coma since soon after his March 2016 sentencing.
Doctors said he suffered extensive loss of brain tissue and “profound weakness and contraction” of his muscles. His eyes opened and blinked, but without any sign that he understood verbal commands or his surroundings.
Unresponsive wakefulness is a new medical term for a persistent vegetative state. Patients in this condition who have survived a coma can open their eyes, but they do not respond to commands. People can live in a state of unresponsive wakefulness for many years with the chances of recovery depending on the extent of the brain injury.
North Korea said Warmbier went into a coma after contracting botulism and taking a sleeping pill, but doctors in Cincinnati said they found no active sign of botulism or evidence of beatings.
Fred Warmbier praised Trump’s administration. He was critical of the approach to his son’s situation taken by former President Barack Obama’s administration.
“At least he got home to his parents,” Trump said during a Monday event with technology executives at the White House, speaking just hours after Warmbier died.
Warmbier, a onetime high school soccer player and homecoming king, was traveling in China in December 2015 when he signed up for a five- day tour
of North Korea with a Chinese company that advertised “budget travel to destinations your mother would rather you stayed away from.”
He was detained at the Pyongyang airport in early January 2016, charged with a “hostile act” against the country’s authoritarian government and convicted less than two months later. His trial lasted an hour.
The State Department warns against travel to North Korea. While nearly all Americans who have been there have left without incident, visitors can be suddenly seized and face lengthy incarceration for what might seem like minor infractions.
Jeffrey Fowle, also from Ohio, was detained in 2014 when he intentionally left a Bible in a nightclub. Fowle was freed after six months. He said he was kept isolated most of the time but was not physically abused. He and others freed from North Korea have said they were coached and coerced into giving confessions.
Three Americans remain in captivity in North Korea. The U. S. government accuses North Korea of using such detainees as political pawns, and North Korea accuses Washington and South Korea of sending spies to overthrow its government.
TENSE RELATIONS
Relations between the United States and the North have worsened in recent months as North Korea’s leader, Kim Jong Un, threatens to attack the United States with nuclear weapons.
Shortly after Trump made his public remarks on Warmbier’s death, he issued a terse statement.
“Otto’s fate deepens my Administration’s determination to prevent such tragedies from befalling innocent people at the hands of regimes that do not respect the rule of law or basic human decency,” Trump said in the statement. “The United States once again condemns the brutality of the North Korean regime as we mourn its latest victim.”
Trump’s Cabinet describes North Korea as the biggest threat the U. S. faces. While officials have reacted to past provocations with alarm and have warned that the U. S. will consider all options in response to North Korea’s defiance, they’ve focused on nonmilitary actions so far, such as enlisting China’s help to tighten the screws on the country.
“We hold North Korea accountable for Otto Warmbier’s unjust imprisonment, and demand the release of three other Americans who have been illegally detained,” Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said in a statement.
Several lawmakers described Warmbier’s death as murder.
Sen. John McCain, R- Ariz., chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said in a statement Monday night: “Otto Warmbier, an American citizen, was murdered by the Kim Jongun regime. In the final year of his life, he lived the nightmare in which the North Korean people have been trapped for 70 years: forced labor, mass starvation, systematic cruelty, torture, and murder.
“North Korea is threatening its neighbors, destabilizing the Asia- Pacific region, and rapidly developing the technology to strike the American homeland with nuclear weapons. Now it has escalated to brutalizing Americans, including three other citizens currently imprisoned in North Korea. The United States of America cannot and should not tolerate the murder of its citizens by hostile powers.”
Sen. Ben Cardin of Maryland, the ranking Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said in a statement Monday evening that “Otto is dead because of Kim Jong- un’s repressive, murderous regime.”
Sen. Marco Rubio, R- Fla., said North Korea must be held accountable for the “murder.”
Warmbier’s death could push Congress or the Trump administration to restrict or ban Americans from traveling to North Korea.
Reps. Adam Schiff, D- Calif., and Joe Wilson, R- S. C., have introduced the North Korea Travel Control Act in the House, which would require Americans who want to travel to North Korea to obtain a license. There would be no licenses for tourists.
The Senate has been more reluctant to introduce restrictions on Americans, but Warmbier’s death might be the trigger that they need, analysts say.
Tillerson has raised the prospect of the administration using an executive order to ban travel to North Korea.
“We have been evaluating whether we should put some type of travel visa restriction to North Korea,” Tillerson told a House committee last week. “We haven’t come to a final conclusion, but we are considering it.”
In Warmbier’s home state, Gov. John Kasich said in a written statement: “All Ohioans mourn the death of Otto Warmbier, a young man of exceptional spirit. Our prayers go out to his family, who have shown great strength and courage throughout this terrible ordeal. This horrendous situation further underscores the evil, oppressive nature of the North Korean regime that has such disregard for human life.”
Teresa Sullivan, president of the University of Virginia, where Warmbier’s class graduated last month, said by phone Monday afternoon: “It’s just such a waste of a promising young life. That’s very hard — that’s very hard to accept.”
She added: “I think we always somewhere, deep down, thought he would come back to us and finish his degree with us.”