Like some seedy racketeer, the delinquents in Pyongyang had extorted a generous payment in exchange for talks about giving up their pursuit of nuclear weapons.
So... Basically, this guy is justifying kidnapping a teenage girl and blackmailing her father, and somehow, the English thought this was totally acceptable when they read it in his book.
But instead of just barging in and rushing to the action, the movie takes its time as Neeson pretends to be a crooked cop trying to extort the criminals.