The Supreme Court of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea has sentenced a South Korea-born US citizen to 10 years of hard labor for subversion and espionage activities.

Kim Dong-chul, who was born in 1953 in Seoul and emigrated to the US in 1972, was charged with plotting to subvert the DPRK system, slandering the supreme leadership of the country and gathering state and military secrets.

According to the prosecutor, Kim was running a trade company in Rason, a special economic zone in the DPRK. But he started spying in 2013 after coming into contact with several South Koreans, who tasked him with collecting top party, state and military secrets of the DPRK.