KUALA LUMPUR/SEOUL: The US government strongly believes that North Korean agents murdered the estranged half-brother of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in Malaysia, a US government source said on Tuesday.
American authorities have not yet determined exactly how Kim Jong Nam was killed, according to the source, who did not provide specific evidence to support the US government’s view.
A South Korean government source also had said earlier that Kim Jong Nam had been murdered in Malaysia. He did not provide further details.
South Korea’s foreign ministry said it could not confirm the reports, and the country’s intelligence agency could not immediately be reached for comment.
In the United States, there was no immediate response to a request for comment from the Trump administration, which faces a stiff challenge from a defiant North Korea over its nuclear arms program and the test of a ballistic missile last weekend.
Kim Jong Nam was known to spend a significant amount of his time outside North Korea and had spoken out publicly against his family’s dynastic control of the isolated state.
In a statement, Malaysian police said the dead man, aged 46, held a passport under the name Kim Chol.
Kim Jong Nam has been caught in the past using forged travel documents.
Malaysian police official Fadzil Ahmat said the cause of Kim’s death was not yet known, and that a post mortem would be carried out.
“So far there are no suspects, but we have started investigations and are looking at a few possibilities to get leads,” Fadzil told Reuters.
According to Fadzil, Kim had been planning to travel to Macau on Monday when he fell ill at the low-cost terminal of Kuala Lumpur International Airport (KLIA).
“The deceased ... felt like someone grabbed or held his face from behind,” Fadzil said. “He felt dizzy, so he asked for help at the ... counter of KLIA.”
Kim was taken to an airport clinic where he still felt unwell, and it was decided to take him to hospital. He died in the ambulance on the way to Putrajaya Hospital, Fadzil added.
The US government source, speaking on condition of anonymity, said it was possible that Kim Jong Nam had been poisoned. The US source said it could not be ruled out that assassins used some kind of “poison pen” device.
South Korea’s TV Chosun, a cable-TV network, reported that Kim had been poisoned with a needle by two women believed to be North Korean operatives who fled in a taxi and were at large, citing multiple South Korean government sources.
Reuters could not independently confirm those details.
Secretive family
Malaysia is one of a dwindling number of countries that has close relations with North Korea, which is under tightening global sanctions over its nuclear tests and ballistic missile launches, the latest of which took place on Sunday.
Malaysians and North Koreans can visit each other’s country without visas.
A phone call to the North Korean embassy in Kuala Lumpur late on Tuesday went straight to an answering machine.
Kim Jong Nam and Kim Jong Un are both sons of former North Korean leader Kim Jong Il, who died in late 2011, but they had different mothers.
Kim Jong Nam, the elder of the two, did not attend his father’s funeral. His mother was an actress named Song Hye Rim, and Kim Jong Nam said his father kept his parents’ relationship a secret.
The portly and easygoing Kim Jong Nam was believed to be close to his uncle, Jang Song Thaek, who was North Korea’s second most powerful man before being executed on Kim Jong Un’s orders in 2013.
In an embarrassing 2001 incident, Kim Jong Nam was caught at an airport in Japan traveling on a forged Dominican Republic passport, saying he had wanted to visit Tokyo Disneyland. He was known to travel to Hong Kong, Macau and mainland China.
Koh Yu-hwan, a professor at Dongguk University in Seoul, said Kim Jong Nam had occasionally been the subject of speculation that he could replace his younger half-brother, the country’s third-generation leader.
“Loyalists may have wanted to get rid of him,” he said.
Kim Jong Nam said several times over the years that he had no interest in leading his country.
“Personally, I am against third-generation succession,” he told Japan’s Asahi TV in 2010. “I hope my younger brother will do his best for the sake of North Koreans’ prosperous lives.”
His cousin, Lee Han-young, who defected to South Korea through Switzerland in 1982, was shot and killed by North Korean agents in Seoul in 1997, according to South Korea.
(Additional reporting by Se Young Lee in Seoul, Joseph Sipalan, Rozanna Latiff, Praveen Menon and A.Ananthalakshmi in Kuala Lumpur and Mark Hosenball in Washington)
N.Korea believed behind murder of leader’s half-brother
N.Korea believed behind murder of leader’s half-brother
Trump says Australia will grant asylum to Iran women footballers
- Presenter on Iranian state TV had branded the players “wartime traitors” after they stood motionless during the anthem
MIAMI: US President Donald Trump said Monday that Australia had agreed to grant asylum to some of Iran’s visiting women’s football team, amid fears they could face retaliation back home for not singing the national anthem before a match.
The gesture ahead of the team’s Asian Cup match against South Korea last week was seen by many as an act of defiance against the Islamic republic just two days after the United States and Israel attacked it.
“I just spoke to Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, of Australia, concerning the Iranian National Women’s Soccer Team. He’s on it! Five have already been taken care of,” Trump said Monday on his Truth Social network, less than two hours after an initial post urging Australia to take them in.
Trump added that “some, however, feel they must go back because they are worried about the safety of their families, including threats to those family members if they don’t return.”
There was no immediate comment from the Australian government, which has so far declined to say whether it could offer the players asylum.
Asked about their case on Sunday, Foreign Minister Penny Wong said Australia “stands in solidarity” with the people of Iran.
The son of Iran’s late shah, US-based Reza Pahlavi, warned on Monday that the refusal to sing the anthem could have “dire consequences,” and urged Australia to offer the team protection.
Trump then weighed in, pressing Albanese to “give ASYLUM” to the team and adding: “The US will take them if you won’t.”
“Australia is making a terrible humanitarian mistake by allowing the Iran National Woman’s Soccer team to be forced back to Iran, where they will most likely be killed,” the US leader said on Truth Social.
Pahlavi, who has not returned to Iran since before the 1979 Islamic revolution that ousted the monarchy, has billed himself as the man to lead a democratic transition to a secular Iran as the theocratic regime fights to survive.
Politicians, human rights activists and even “Harry Potter” author J.K. Rowling have also called for the team to be offered official protection.
“Please, protect these young women,” Rowling said in a post on social media.
‘Save our girls’
A presenter on Iranian state TV had branded the players “wartime traitors” after they stood motionless during the anthem before their match against South Korea.
In subsequent games, the players saluted and sang.
Crowds gathered outside the Gold Coast stadium where the side played their last match over the weekend, banging drums and shouting “regime change for Iran.”
They then surrounded the Iranian team bus, chanting “let them go” and “save our girls.”
On Monday, an AFP journalist saw members of the team speaking on phones from their balcony of their hotel.
Asked about the possibility of granted asylum, a spokesperson for Australia’s Home Affairs department told AFP earlier it “cannot comment on the circumstances of individuals.”
Amnesty International campaigner Zaki Haidari said they faced persecution, or worse, if they were sent home.
“Some of these team members probably have had their families already threatened,” Haidari told AFP.
“Them going back... who knows what sort of punishment they will receive?“
Despite being heavily monitored, the side would have a “small window of opportunity” to seek asylum at the airport, he said.
Iran’s embassy in Australia did not respond to a request for comment.
