Tags: North Korea

Japanese and North Korean officials will meet next week for an update on the North's probe into the fate of Japanese citizens it kidnapped decades ago, Japan's top government spokesman said on Thursday.

Matthew Miller, the American held in North Korea since April for "hostile acts", began a six-year hard labor sentence on Thursday that he said involved farm work and isolation, media reports said.

An American recently sentenced to six years hard labor by a North Korean court pretended to have secret U.S. information and was deliberately arrested in a bid to become famous and meet U.S. missionary Kenneth Bae in a North Korean prison, state media said on Saturday.