US sent medicine to citizen held in N. Korea:

The United States government has sent medicine and checked up on the health of its citizen detained by North Korea since November, a Radio Free Asia (RFA) report said Saturday.

The report, citing sources in South Korea, said the U.S. State Department has been sending medicine to Jun Young-su, a Korean-American who has been accused of conducting illegal religious activities in the communist country.

Pyongyang views such activities as subversive measures aimed at undermining the regime.

The RFA said the delivery was made through the Swedish embassy in the North Korean capital that serves as a "protecting power" for the U.S. in the North since Washington has no formal diplomatic ties with the isolationist country.

The Swedish embassy, in addition, conducted medical checkups on Jun, who is in his 60s.

The broadcaster, meanwhile, claimed that Washington and Pyongyang have already concluded talks on releasing Jun, and that former U.S. President Jimmy Carter should be able to bring him home later in the month.

Carter, who has acted as an intermediary in the past, is expected to visit North Korea in late April.

The U.S. citizen, a preacher at a Korean church in Orange County, California, had entered the country on a business visa. (Yonhap)