SYDNEY (REUTERS, BLOOMBERG) – An Australian student who went missing in North Korea has been released, Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison said on Thursday (July 4).

“Mr Alek Sigley has been released from detention in the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea,” Morrison told Parliament, referring to North Korea by its official name.

“Alek is safe and well … we were advised that the DPRK have released him from detention and he has safely left the country and I can confirm that he has arrived safely.”

North Korea-focused news site NK News earlier reported that Sigley had arrived in Beijing and would soon travel on to Tokyo, citing unidentified sources familiar with the situation.

Sigley, 29, one of only a handful of Western students in the secretive country, went missing last week, with his family saying they had not heard from the university student, who was based in the North Korean capital of Pyongyang, since June 25.

His release follows a visit to North Korea by a special envoy of the Swedish government acting on behalf of Australian authorities.

Sigley – a postgraduate student of Korean literature at Kim Il Sung University – ran tours for foreign students and posted about the country on social media until going missing on June 24 and failing to contact his family.

His release will be a relief to his family and Australian authorities, with Morrison raising the issue with several leaders at last weekend’s Group of 20 meetings in Osaka, Japan.

North Korea stoked ire in the US when college student Otto Warmbier died in 2017 following more than a year of captivity in the Asian country. “We all couldn’t be more pleased,” Morrison said on Thursday, thanking Swedish authorities for their help.

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