While Laura Ling and Euna Lee spent about five months detained in North Korea, these South Koreans being held captive in North Korea I expect will be having a much longer stay:

On the 131th day of North Korea’s detention of a South Korean worker in Kaesong, President Lee Myung-bak urged the nation to be patient, saying that the administration is doing all it can to bring him and four detained fishermen home.

After four days of summer vacation, Lee was briefed yesterday by Kim Sung-hwan, senior secretary for foreign affairs and security to the president, about the outlook of inter-Korean and North-U.S. relations in the wake of former U.S. President Bill Clinton’s visit to Pyongyang.

Clinton’s trip helped secure the release of the two jailed American reporters.

“After he was briefed by senior secretaries, the president said the government has been playing all possible roles to free the South Korean worker in Kaesong and the crewmen of [the fishing boat] Yeonan,” said Lee Dong-kwan, the Blue House spokesman.

“The government is fully aware of the people’s concerns and worries about this issue that is directly related to South Korean lives and safety,” President Lee was quoted as saying. “The Korean people should have faith in the government and wait and see.”

While there has been no visible sign that Pyongyang will soon release the five detainees, much is happening quietly, the presidential spokesman said. “Just because you don’t see anything on the surface, you often fail to notice the movements beneath the water,” he said, without offering details. “Please be patient.”  [Joong Ang Ilbo]

Here is what former US President Bill Clinton had to say about this issue when he stopped by Pyongyang to pick up the two US journalists:

Quoting unnamed sources, The Wall Street Journal said, “Clinton informed North Korea’s leadership that it could win economic and diplomatic rewards from Seoul and Tokyo if Pyongyang released South Korean and Japanese nationals kidnapped during five decades of Cold War conflict.”

Nothing like rewarding terrorism, but when it comes to North Korea that has been the status quo for many years now.