His first was the dark and cramped detention facility at Riyadh airport, where he was arrested on a red notice by Interpol before having his morning coffee. His new cell was full of even more people and now his wrists and ankles were locked. “I saw that the situation could be quite unstable … my strategy was just to sit, look at the floor and have no eye contact with anyone,” he told Sky News. There was a time when he believed that his visit to Pyongyang in North Korea in April 2019 was just a quirky tourist trip, something about which a story could be told. Now, almost three years later, the 30-year-old was in a foreign prison facing extradition to the United States. The US Department of Justice has suspected that Emms and a Spanish co-accused had organized a cryptocurrency conference in Pyongyang, advising the North Korean government to use the technology to deal with a banking embargo imposed by the . Image: Christopher Emms spoke at the Blockchain World Forum in Dubai in 2018 At the time of Emms’ arrest, a sealed indictment charged the couple with conspiracy with an American encryption developer named Virgil Griffith for violating the International Law on Emergency Financial Powers, an offense punishable by a fine of up to $ 1 million. 20 years old. . Griffith himself had already pleaded guilty to the charge and was sentenced to more than five years in prison. In an exclusive interview with Sky News detailing his experiences in North Korea and Saudi Arabia, Emms, now on bail in Jeddah, said he was innocent and had informed the British security services of his trip without provoking them. alarm. He asks the US to allow him to return to the UK to deal with extradition proceedings from there. “I really want to go back to my homeland and deal with it through the British judiciary, which I do not think is too much to ask, even from the Americans,” he said. Image: Virgil Griffith pleads guilty and sentenced to more than five years Arriving in Pyongyang In 2018, Emms was a regular speaker on the cryptocurrency conference circuit. He was the head of business development at bitcoin.com and had started his own business that included providing legal services and compliance services for the most recent cryptocurrency craze at the time: the initial currency bids. He told Sky News that the operation was “a huge failure in many ways” because “even now, but especially then, it was largely a wild west”. In those days, “there was a blockchain conference of some description somewhere around the world at least three times a week,” he said, but it was still unusual when the man who became his co-accused, Alejandro Cao de Benoit, approached him to talk to one in Pyongyang. . “My initial reaction was, ‘Look, is it legal?’ Will I violate any law by doing this? “, So I did my due diligence, checking the British Government website when I traveled to North Korea. “Citizen, I would be breaking a law and it did not seem that I would be breaking laws,” he said. Cao de Benos comes from an aristocratic family in Spain and has been a staunch public supporter of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea for several decades, leading the International Association of Korean Friendship, which celebrates Supreme Leader Kim Jong Un and offers tours of the country. “I do not really know the gentleman,” Ems said, explaining that they had talked about the conference but had not kept in touch. “All I can comment on is what we all see on the internet on its various channels, so, you know, I think it speaks for itself.” Repression after pornography discovered on the phone North Korea was “almost exactly what you see in any kind of documentary ever made by any Western journalist,” Ems said. They arrived and their passports were thoroughly checked before being released to go through the baggage check and “what seems to be a normal customs office you should fly to the UK for example, but it is not the same” because the officers started going inside from all images on visitors’ electronic devices. “That was when it first got very scary,” Emms said. “One of the gentlemen who attended the conference had decided for some reason to bring a pornographic film. “This was discovered by the authorities. So immediately when it happened, everyone’s passport was confiscated. This is your first impression. Again, you can imagine what it is like. It does not feel good.” Without their documents they were transferred to their hotel “which is essentially a complex, there is no way out [and] You can not enter unless you are accredited to stay in this hotel, which is almost empty. “ They took them on standard tourist tours, visited sites around Pyongyang and went on a day trip to the demilitarized zone from where they could look south. “And then, to the back end [of the trip] “There was this ‘conference’ without quotes,” Ems said. “It simply came to our notice then. It would be very difficult to describe it as a conference as we know it in a conventional sense. “Essentially, we were given materials that we were told were pre-approved by the North Korean government, which were key pieces of paper that were copied and pasted by Google that had very basic blockchain information. And we start getting hints from local drivers, if you will, “better go well”, and they keep telling us “better go well, this is a very serious thing that happened with this video that was shown. was discovered “, so everyone is very willing”. Image: Pyongyang Sci-Tech Complex was built in 2015. Photo: Christophe95 / CC4.0 “We were told you had to play” According to Emms, the conference itself took place in a large facility “but there was no one in it except us [the speakers] and these people who are present, I would not say more than 20 people “. “What we ended up doing at this conference is, you know, reading the fact sheets and obviously lying a little bit, but not trying to break any law or anything. “It was so boring that most of the participants were falling asleep. I actually fell asleep myself at some point.” According to the FBI, Emms opened the conference by saying: “I’m sure a lot of people in this room [who] “Working in the banking system, they will understand how much the United States primarily controls the way money moves around the world, and that can be very, very unfair.” He talked about how cryptocurrencies make it “possible to transfer money to any country in the world, regardless of … sanctions”, the indictment states. Speaking to Sky News, Emms said: “I think you have to put it in the context of what I explained about the kind of pressure we were all receiving in that room. “You know, we were told you had to play. The last thing I would do there and say was, ‘I totally disagree. [sic] with each sanction [and] embargo on North Korea “. I really believe that this would put me in a very real danger if I did. “ Only when the conference ended, shortly before leaving for the airport, did Ems and the other attendees get their passports back. “Shortly before I left for the airport, and many people do not know this because I did not make it public in any way, I was the only person, I was called to my hotel room and I searched my hotel room and the drivers interrogated me. “So this whole assumption or accusation that I was somehow a friend of North Korea is completely untrue. It was a very scary experience.” Ems said they did not search him physically, but “the whole room was overturned after check out and they asked me to go inside. And then I will always remember very vividly that the cleaners were out with a lot of, you know, frowning faces if you will. “And these guys were asking me why you hid something in your room? Do you have something like that? If you were recording us, if you did that, it was all these kinds of questions. “Well, you know, I was sitting there and I was really praying on the way back to the airport bus that they would seal me up to put me on a plane that, thankfully, I did without problems, but it was scary. “ Interactions with the British authorities The indictment against Emms cites a text message he sent to the group of attendees stating: “Hello everyone, I was just pulled over by the police at the airport[.] I would recommend that you remove any photos of the conference, as they knew a lot. “ He told Sky News that “he was picked up at Gatwick Airport when I landed in the UK, having returned, and was asked some very basic questions about what happened, which I complied with. “As soon as I got home, I was so worried that I called the British Secret Service helpline and said, ‘Look, if I can help you, contact me. I did not intend to do anything wrong if I did something wrong.’ wrong, let me know and let’s solve it. “ “And I did not hear anything until after the arrest of Virgil Griffith, during which I spent some time with the British authorities in Dubai, where I have been living for the last few years. “At the end of the year I spent with them, you know, they made it clear to me that they did not feel I was doing anything wrong and that they were not going to go any further. So I thought this is it, it does not matter, we will leave it there “. Emms told Sky News: “I’m not a supporter of North …
