Kim’s brother was CIA source

• North Korea urges US to change ‘hostile policy’
• Hundreds of N Korean public execution sites identified: survey

Kim Jong Nam, the estranged half-brother of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un who was killed in Malaysia in 2017, was a CIA informant, the Wall Street Journal reported yesterday.

Citing “a person knowledgeable about the matter”, the paper said Kim Jong Nam had met with CIA operatives several times.

Kim Jong Nam, who was once seen as heir apparent to the North’s leadership, died after having his face smeared with the outlawed VX nerve agent as he waited at Kuala Lumpur airport.

According to the Journal’s source there was a “nexus” between Kim Jong Nam and the CIA, but the paper said many details of his connection with the intelligence agency were unclear.

The source said Kim Jong Nam travelled to Malaysia in February 2017 to meet his CIA contact, but that may not have been the only purpose of his trip.

Kim Jong Nam died after being attacked at Kuala Lumpur International Airport on February 13, 2017 in a Cold War-style assassination that shocked the world.

Two young women, one Vietnamese and one Indonesian, were arrested and charged with the murder. They insisted they were tricked by North Korean agents into carrying out the hit and had thought it was a reality TV show prank.

Malaysian prosecutors eventually dropped the murder charges against them and Indonesian Siti Aisyah was released in March this year while her Vietnamese co-accused Doan Thi Huong was freed in May.

Meanwhile, North Korean state media yesterday called on the US to “withdraw its hostile policy” towards Pyongyang or agreements made at a landmark summit in Singapore a year ago might become “a blank sheet of paper”.

“The arrogant and unilateral US policy will never work on the DPRK, which values sovereignty,” KCNA said.

The report said a four-point joint statement signed by Trump and Kim on June 12 last year pledging to work towards a new relationship “is in danger of being a blank sheet of paper because the US is turning a blind eye to its implementation”.

A rights group in its report said yesterday North Korea conducts public executions to incite fear among the public. The report by the Seoul-based Transitional Justice Working Group (TJWG) pinpointed at least 323 sites used by the government for capital punishment.

The report is the result of four years of research and interviews with more than 600 North Korean defectors living outside the country.