U.S. Official Dispatched to N. Korea to Seek Pilot’s Release

Responding to an opening from the Pyongyang regime, the Clinton Administration sent a high-ranking diplomat to North Korea on Monday to try to secure the release of a U.S. pilot downed there 10 days ago.

Thomas Hubbard, deputy assistant secretary of state for East Asian and Pacific affairs, left here Monday and is scheduled to cross the demilitarized zone into North Korea on Wednesday, officials here said.

His goal is to return with Army Chief Warrant Officer Bobby Hall, whose helicopter strayed into North Korean airspace Dec. 17 and was shot down. Last week, the remains of his co-pilot, Chief Warrant Officer David Hilemon, were turned over to U.S. authorities.

North Korea, in a dispatch by the official Korean Central News Agency monitored today in Tokyo, charged that the intrusion was “a deliberate act of espionage.”

North Korean soldiers “sent warning signals twice . . . but the helicopter continued flying northward along a ravine,” the agency said. “The helicopter was hit by one shot and fell aflame into a ravine. . . . The intrusion . . . has turned out not to be an ‘accidental case’ caused by a ‘mistake’ in a mere training flight.”

The dispatch charged that “bellicose quarters of the United States are attempting to resolve the problem through pressure while trying to conceal the truth of the incident.” If Washington wants “a smooth solution,” the agency declared, “it must admit its responsibility as the offender and clearly show an honest and reasonable attitude before it is too late.”

U.S. officials have insisted the crew was not on an intelligence mission. They have suggested that the helicopter strayed into North Korean airspace because its crew was disoriented by heavy snow.

Hubbard was dispatched to North Korea after the government there wrote to the United Nations asking for the Americans to send a representative to Pyongyang to discuss Hall’s repatriation. Administration officials, their hopes already dashed for the downed aviator’s release by Christmas Day, reacted quickly, sending a recognized Korean expert.

“Mr. Hubbard has been involved in negotiations with this case since the beginning,” said a State Department official. “He’s well-known to the Koreans and well-acquainted with issues involving the two countries.”

Another Administration official said the request for a high-level U.S. representative to enter the negotiations was a favorable sign.

State Department officials declined to detail how long Hubbard will remain in North Korea or what he might offer there.

But Rep. Bill Richardson, (D-N.M.), a House Intelligence Committee member who was touring North Korean nuclear sites when the U.S. helicopter went down, said the talks are stalled because of rifts between North Korean diplomats and military leaders.

“I think there’s a lot of gamesmanship going on between the North Korean Foreign Ministry that wants to resolve this issue and the North Korean military, which is reluctant,” he said in an interview here. “So I think the North Korean diplomats calling for a U.S. envoy to go there shows that they want to resolve this issue and get some leverage over the military.”

Times staff writer David Holley in Tokyo contributed to this report.