Warmbier remains hospitalized after his arrival late Tuesday aboard a medevac flight following North Korea’s decision to release him for what it called humanitarian reasons.
WYOMING, Ohio — Over and over, Otto Warmbier apologized and begged — at first calmly, then choking up and finally in tears — to be reunited with his family.
North Korean officials seated at long tables watched impassively, with cameras rolling and journalists taking notes, as the adventuresome, accomplished 21-year-old college student from suburban Cincinnati talked animatedly about the “severe crime” that had put him there: trying to take a propaganda banner for someone back home, supposedly in return for a used car and to impress a semi-secret society he wanted to join, and all under the supposed direction of the U. S. government.
“I have made the worst mistake of my life!” he exclaimed as his formally staged Feb. 29,2016, “confession” to anti-state activities ended in Pyongang.
More than 15 months later, he has finally been reunited with his parents and two younger siblings.
Whether he is even aware of that is uncertain.
“His neurological condition can be best described as a state of unresponsive wakefulness, ” said Dr. Daniel Kanter, director of neurocritical care for the University of Cincinnati Health system. Doctors say he has suffered “severe neurological injury, ” with extensive loss of brain tissue and “profound weakness and contraction” of his muscles, arms and legs. His eyes will open and blink, but without signs of understanding verbal commands or his surroundings.
Warmbier, now 22, remains hospitalized at the UC Medical Center immediately after his arrival late Tuesday aboard a medevac flight following North Korea’s decision to release him for what it called humanitarian reasons — and under strong pressure after the Trump administration learned of his condition in a special U. S. envoy’s June 6 meeting in New York with North Korea’s ambassador to the United Nations.
Related: Three Americans Still Held by North Korea Following Otto Warmbier’s Release
His parents, Fred and Cindy Warmbier, were told he had been in a coma since shortly after being sentenced March 16,2016, to 15 years of prison with hard labor.
If life had gone to plan, he today would be in his first month as a new graduate of the University of Virginia.
He had planned to study abroad in his third year of college in China and heard about Chinese travel companies offering trips to North Korea. His parents were OK with it.
“Otto’s a young, thrill-seeking, great kid who was going to be in that part of the world for a college experience, ” Fred Warmbier explained.
Young Pioneer Tours described itself as providing “budget tours to destinations your mother would rather you stayed away from.” They also included Iran, Iraq and former Soviet countries.
He booked a five-day tour for late December 2015 and was in the process of leaving on Jan. 2 2016, to return to China when he was detained.
The U. S. State Department warns against travel to North Korea. While nearly all Americans who have been there have left without incident, visitors can be suddenly seized and face lengthy incarceration for what might seem to them to be minor infractions.
