He's twenty-one years old. He can drive a heavy vehicle, vote for politicians that affect all of society, and die in a uniform for his country.
> doesn't deserve 15 years for tearing down a poster
I don't think he deserves it either. I also don't think people deserve years of jailtime for simple possession of drugs, yet american jails are full of such people. The same kind of "kids" who make the same kind of decisions ("this will be fun!"). The right thing to do there is not imprison those people - even if you think possession should be illegal, years of jailtime is too excessive a punishment.
The only thing that makes this newsworthy is that it happened in NK, and he's 'lucky' about that - because newsworthy = publicly visible, and that means the government is more likely to get involved. If this had happened in a place like Eritrea, it'd be lucky to make the news, because as I said above, this kind of stuff happens to hundreds of people every year.
Nobody is saying he does.
> and it's the _right thing to do_ to help him.
Sure, but that's not the question. The question is: Is it the right thing to do to help him, at the expense of helping someone else? They don't deserve it either.
But life is unfair, and we can only do so much at once - this is basic opportunity cost. It's simply impossible for us to do everything at once - we're merely human. Even when your goal is to eventually save everyone, you have to prioritize.
Even when the stakes are as high as helping people survive North Korea. Perhaps especially then - when it matters most to do as much good as possible.
There have been batch releases in the past, these releases can be "bundled."
The kid simply doesn't deserve it and it's the _right thing to do_ to help him.