American journalists Laura Ling and Euna Lee have been sentenced to 12 years in a North Korean prison camp after the kangaroo Central Court confirmed them as “grave threats” against the dictatorial regime. They were convicted of “hostile acts” and illegal entry into the communist country.

They were arrested in March after allegedly crossing into North Korea from China.

The trial comes amid growing tensions over North Korea’s nuclear programme which is prompting US-led sanctions.

“The trial confirmed the grave crime they (the reporters) committed against the Korean nation and their illegal border crossing as they had already been indicted and sentenced each of them to 12 years of reform through labour,” state-run KCNA news agency said in a brief report.

The news agency gave no further details.

No, it wouldn’t now, would it. Reports have actually indicated that Lee and Ling were captured while on Chinese soil, though Pynongyang insists that the reporters for Current TV had illegally entered the country. The DPRK court has mastered Orwellian Rhetoric 101:

It said the court, after a five-day trial, “sentenced each of them to 12 years of reform through labour”.

Exactly what, if anything, the United States will do in response to the severe sentence for a non-existant crime isn’t clear. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has called the charges baseless, but so far the response has been restricted to rhetoric only.