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AP Exclusive: Richardson, Google delegation pressing NKorea for missile ban, open Internet
• PYONGYANG, North Korea (AP) -- Former New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson said Wednesday that his delegation is pressing North Korea to put a moratorium on missile launches and nuclear tests and to allow more cell phones and an open Internet for its citizens.
• Richardson told The Associated Press in an exclusive interview in Pyongyang that the group is also asking for fair and humane treatment for an American citizen detained in North Korea. Also on the trip is Google Executive Chairman Eric Schmidt.
• "The citizens of the DPRK (North Korea) will be better off with more cell phones and an active Internet. Those are the ... messages we've given to a variety of foreign policy officials, scientists" and government officials, Richardson said.
• Most North Koreans have never logged onto the Internet, and the country's authoritarian government strictly limits access to the World Wide Web.
• Richardson has said the delegation is on a private, humanitarian trip. Schmidt, who is the highest-profile U.S. business executive to visit North Korea since leader Kim Jong Un took power a year ago, has not spoken publicly about the reasons behind the journey to North Korea.
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Influential Chinese newspaper to publish as management, reporters pull back from standoff
• GUANGZHOU, China (AP) -- Communist Party-backed management and rebellious staff at an influential weekly newspaper stepped back Wednesday from a contentious standoff over censorship that spilled over to the wider public and turned into an unexpected test of the new Chinese leadership's tolerance for political reform.
• Hopes among supporters of the Southern Weekly that the dispute would strike a blow against censorship appeared to fizzle with a tentative resolution. Under an agreement reached Tuesday, editors and reporters at the newspaper will not be punished for protesting and stopping work in anger over a propaganda official's heavy-handed rewriting of a New Year's editorial last week, according to two members of the editorial staff. One, an editor, said propaganda officials will no longer directly censor content prior to publication, though other longstanding controls remain (Continued on page 34)
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