Trump on release of 3 American prisoners in North Korea: "Stay tuned!"

President Donald Trump hinted Wednesday evening that three American prisoners being held in North Korea will soon be released as a goodwill gesture ahead of his fast-approaching summit with Kim Jong Un.

“As everybody is aware," Trump tweeted, "the past Administration has long been asking for three hostages to be released from a North Korean Labor camp, but to no avail. Stay tuned!”

Citing an unnamed official with knowledge of the negotiations, CNN reported that the release of the men was imminent. The Financial Times, citing Choi Sung-ryong, a leading campaigner on the issue of North Korea’s abductions, reported that the men had already been released from a North Korean labor camp weeks ago, and were getting “health treatment and ideological education” at a hotel near Pyongyang ahead of their handover to U.S. officials.

Read: WTF happens now with North Korea?

The three men — Kim Hak-song, Kim Sang-duk, also known as Tony Kim, and Kim Dong-chul — are the last American prisoners in North Korea, after college student Otto Warmbier was released back to the U.S. in a vegetative state in June 2017. He died days later.

Two of the men were arrested last year on charges of “hostile acts” against North Korea. The men had both worked at the Pyongyang University of Science and Technology, North Korea’s only privately run university, which is funded largely by evangelical Christians in the U.S. and China.

Tony Kim was detained at Pyongyang airport in April 2017 as he was about to leave the country, having spent a month teaching accounting at the university and then volunteering at an orphanage.

The following month, Kim Hak-song was also arrested. The Chinese-born ethnic Korean, who became a U.S. citizen in the 2000s, had been working at the university in the field of agricultural development.

The third prisoner, Kim Dong-chul, had been running a trading and hotel services company in Rason, a North Korean special economic zone. He was sentenced to 10 years hard labor in April 2016 on charges of spying and other offenses.

U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo raised the issue of the prisoners when he met with Kim Jong Un in Pyongyang in secret over Easter weekend.

Trump said last month that the U.S. was “fighting very diligently” to get the men back. His new national security adviser John Bolton told Fox News Sunday that if Pyongyang releases the men ahead of the planned Trump-Kim summit, “it will be an opportunity to demonstrate their authenticity.”

Cover image: In this April 29, 2016, file photo, Kim Dong Chul, center, a U.S. citizen detained in North Korea, is escorted to his trialin Pyongyang, North Korea. He was sentenced in April 2016 to 10 years in prison with hard labor after being convicted of espionage. (AP Photo/Kim Kwang Hyon, File)