CNN.com - U.S. may delay Jenkins action

(CNN) -- The United States may delay its request for Japan to hand over accused U.S. Army deserter Charles Jenkins, opening the way for him to seek medical treatment in Tokyo.

Jenkins, 64, a U.S. Army sergeant alleged to have defected to North Korea 39 years ago, is facing serious health problems.

He is expected to arrive in Tokyo on Sunday evening. If he does, the United States had earlier said it would seek to take him into custody.

But U.S. Ambassador Howard Baker said Saturday the U.S. government was sympathetic to Jenkins' condition and may delay any action, the Associated Press reported.

Baker's remarks were made after he met Japanese Foreign Minister Yoriko Kawaguchi on Saturday.

"Foreign Minister Kawaguchi told me that Sgt. Jenkins' medical condition is serious and asked that the United States consider the humanitarian aspects of this case," Baker said in a statement faxed by the U.S. Embassy.

"I acknowledged to Foreign Minister Kawaguchi that the U.S. government is sympathetic to his health condition and that Sgt. Jenkins' medical condition may delay our request for his transfer to U.S. custody."

According to the Associated Press, Baker said U.S. Embassy officials had no plans to meet Jenkins "in the immediate future."

Jenkins, who disappeared while on patrol near the Demilitarized Zone in 1965, is expected to be taken to a Tokyo university hospital as soon as he arrives from Indonesia on Sunday evening with his Japanese wife Hitomi Soga and their two North Korean-born daughters, a Cabinet Office spokesman said Saturday.

Jenkins and his daughters left North Korea last week and went to Indonesia -- a country that has no extradition treaty with the United States -- to be reunited with Soga after a two-year separation.

Soga was kidnapped by North Korean spies in 1978 and taken from Japan to the communist state. She was one of at least 15 Japanese citizens grabbed to help train North Korean spies.

But in 2002, she returned to her homeland as part of a program to improve bilateral relations between Japan and North Korea.

Fourteen years ago, while still being held in North Korea, she met and married Jenkins.

After his 1965 disappearance, Jenkins appeared in propaganda films and lived in North Korea for nearly four decades.

Afraid he would be arrested and extradited to the United States, Jenkins did not join his wife when she left for Japan two years ago.

Debated fate

Jenkins with Soga and daughters Belinda, left, and Mika during their stay in Jakarta.

During that time, he and his two daughters, Mika and Belinda, waited for Soga's return while Japan, North Korea and the United States debated their fate.

U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell noted that while the Japanese were treating the situation as a humanitarian issue, "Sgt. Jenkins is, of course, a deserter from the U.S. Army and those charges are still outstanding."

Last week the foreign ministers of Japan and North Korea agreed to allow the family to reunite in Indonesia.

"They are allowed to stay one month. Of course, we will be flexible if they need more time to stay longer in Indonesia," Hassan Wirayuda, Indonesian foreign minister, said of the plan.

Earlier this week, at a State Department briefing in Washington, spokesman Richard Boucher said the United States viewed Jenkins as a deserter charged with "extremely serious offenses."

"We understand Japan plans to bring him there for medical treatment. Once he is there, he falls under Japanese-U.S. status policy. We intend to request custody when we have legal opportunity to do so," Boucher said.

Some officials hope Jenkins could provide the United States with valuable information on the reclusive communist nation, which Washington accuses of having a nuclear weapons program.