By Kim Sue-young
Staff Reporter
Hyundai Asan President and CEO Cho Kun-shik will likely visit North Korea next week in a bid to win the release of a company employee detained there for about 130 days, according to reports Friday.
The move, which is raising hopes for his release, comes after the United States successfully brought two detained journalists home by dispatching former President Bill Clinton the reclusive state earlier this week.
In a related development, President Lee Myung-bak said the government is ``doing all it can'' for the release of the detainee.
Lee asked people to ``trust the government and let it do its work.''
President Lee made the remarks after being briefed on Clinton's North Korea visit by Kim Sung-hwan, senior presidential secretary for foreign affairs and security, at Cheong Wa Dae, presidential spokesman Lee Dong-kwan said.
The 44-year-old Yu was apprehended in a joint industrial complex in the North Korean city of Gaeseong on March 30 for allegedly insulting the country's regime and attempting to entice a woman to defect to South Korea.
Hyundai Asan CEO Cho is expected to make a three-day trip to the Gaeseong complex from Monday for talks with North Korean officials to win the release of Yu, reports said.
The Ministry of Unification, however, denied the reports.
``Hyundai Asan is a developer of the industrial park. Its officials frequently visit North Korea. We have been informed of nothing about Cho's Gaeseong visit yet,'' ministry spokesman Chun Hae-sung told reporters, reiterating that the government is doing its utmost to have Yu sent home.
Some observers say that the detainee might come back home before the Aug. 15 Liberation Day, indicating that behind-the-scenes negotiations have been underway between the two Koreas.
The expectations come after North Korea sent Ri Jong-hyuk, vice chairman of the Korean Asia-Pacific Peace Committee in charge of inter-Korean relations, to the Mt. Geumgang resort at a time when Hyundai Group Chairwoman Hyun Jung-eun was visiting there earlier this week. The conglomerate is Hyundai Asan's parent company.
The North Korean official was reported to have visited there on the occasion of the anniversary of the death of Hyundai Group Chairman Chung Mong-hun, Hyun's husband, who operated the Mt. Geumgang tour program.
The fishing boat 800 Yeonan with its four crewmen onboard have also been detained by Pyeongyang after the vessel accidentally crossed the Northern Limited Line (NLL) on July 30 because of a possible malfunction of its navigation system.
South Korea has urged North Korea to immediately return the fishermen but the secretive state reiterated that a concerned agency is investigating the case.
South Korean civic groups, including the Abductees' Family Union, called for the immediate release of the detainees.
The governing Grand National Party (GNP) also blasted North Korea for the detention, recalling the release of the two American journalists, Laura Ling and Euna Lee.
``The two Americans were allowed to meet with the Swedish ambassador to Pyongyang during their detention and even call their families. But we don't even known about Yu at all,'' Rep. Kim Chung-hoon said. ``This discrimination is very insulting.''