North Korea sentences Canadian pastor to hard labour for life

North Korea’s highest court has sentenced a South Korea-born Canadian pastor to hard labour for life for subversion. Hyeon Soo Lim, the head pastor at a Toronto church that is one of Canada’s largest, has been held by North Korea since February. He had appeared on North Korean state media earlier this year confessing to crimes against the state. The prosecution sought the death penalty, but the defense asked for leniency despite the gravity of his crimes “so that he can witness for himself the reality of the nation of the Sun as it grows in power and prosperity,” the KCNA news agency said.

…not only viciously defaming the highest dignity of Korea and its system but also possessing the wicked intention of trying to topple the Republic by staging an anti-state conspiracy.

Pastor Hyeon Soo Lim admits his ‘crimes’

North Korea has previously sentenced a Korean-American missionary Kenneth Bae to 15 years of hard labor but released him last year after holding him for two years. In July, Lim appeared at a news conference in North Korea and confessed that he had travelled there on the pretext of humanitarian work and gathered information that he used in sermons outside the country to drive the regime to a collapse “with the love of God”.