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US solder jailed for rape in South Korea | US solder jailed for rape in South Korea |
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A US soldier based in South Korea has been sentenced to 10 years in prison for raping a teenager near his base. | |
The 21-year-old broke into the studio room of the woman and carried out a sexual attack lasting several hours, threatening her with scissors. | |
The judge called it a "violent and abnormal assault". | |
The sentence was one of the longest given to a US solder in South Korea. US government and military officials have apologised publicly for the rape. | |
Crimes committed by US soldiers in the past have sparked public protests against the American military presence in South Korea. | |
The soldier, whose name has not been made public, attacked the 18-year-old in the early hours of 24 September. | |
He broke into her room near the his base in Dongducheon city. | |
The court said the soldier had also stolen 5,000 won ($4.50; £2.80) from the woman before he fled. | |
"He deserves a stern punishment as there were no efforts to compensate the victim or remedy the assault," said the judge. | |
America has more than 28,000 troops stationed in South Korea - a legacy from the 1950-53 Korean War. | |
The BBC's Lucy Williamson in Seoul says much of the public anger over their presence surrounds the question of who has jurisdiction to try them in criminal cases. | |
The military pact between the two countries states that America has jurisdiction to try its South Korea-based soldiers. | |
But military officials say in recent years they have honoured every request from the South Korean authorities to try American personnel accused of serious crimes, our correspondent adds. | |
The heaviest sentence handed down by a South Korean court was for a US soldier convicted of murder in the early 1990s. He was jailed for life, but later had his sentenced commuted and was freed in 2006. |