BBC apologizes to university students over North Korea documentary

The British Broadcasting Corp. said in London Monday it will apologize for using a university trip to North Korea to shoot a documentary film. Reporter John Sweeney, his wife and a third unidentified person, all BBC journalists, accompanied a group of London School of Economics students to North Korea in early 2013, and Sweeney used video footage and information he acquired for "Panorama: North Korea Undercover," which was seen on British television in April 2013. Several of the students on the trip said they only became aware a BBC journalist was embedded within their group when they reached the North Korean capital. The director of the London School of Economics and the father of one unidentified student complained to the BBC about the risks to which the students were exposed, the British newspaper the Guardian reported. The BBC Trust, governing body of the BBC, said it would apologize in writing to the students, and said in a statement the information given to the students about the journalists accompanying them "was insufficient and inadequate. "The BBC failed to consider a number of important issues and risks, and failed to deal with them appropriately," the statement said.