KUALA LUMPUR: Kuala Lumpur has canceled a visa-free travel deal with Pyongyang as a diplomatic spat deepens over the assassination of the half-brother of North Korea’s leader, national news agency Bernama reported Thursday.
The government implemented the change on the grounds of national security, the Malaysian news agency quoted the country’s deputy prime minister Ahmad Zahid Hamidi as saying.
The cancelation will take effect on March 6, after which North Koreans entering Malaysia will be required to obtain a visa, the report added.
Before the murder of Kim Jong-Nam at Kuala Lumpur International Airport on February 13, the two countries enjoyed relatively warm ties, with some bilateral trade and citizens of both nations entitled to travel to the other under a unique reciprocal visa-free deal.
The cancelation comes after members of the powerful ruling party, the United Malays National Organization, held a protest outside the North Korean embassy last week and demanded Malaysia end the free visa ruling.
Two female suspects in the attack, Indonesian Siti Aisyah, 25, and Doan Thi Huong, 28, from Vietnam, were charged with murder on Wednesday.
Malaysia has arrested one North Korean and named several others as suspects.
Seoul says the government of North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un ordered the killing of Kim Jong-Nam, who died after his face was rubbed with a powerful nerve agent, and engaged two outsiders to carry it out.
The spectacular killing sparked an international probe and lurid stories of Pyongyang’s Cold War-style tradecraft.
North Korea, which has not acknowledged the dead man’s identity, has vehemently protested the investigation, saying Malaysia is in cahoots with its enemies.
Malaysia had already recalled its envoy to Pyongyang and also summoned the North Korean ambassador to Kuala Lumpur.
Malaysia cancels N.Korea visa-free deal after Kim murder
Malaysia cancels N.Korea visa-free deal after Kim murder
‘Keep dreaming’: NATO chief says Europe can’t defend itself without US
BRUSSELS: NATO chief Mark Rutte warned Monday Europe cannot defend itself without the United States, in the face of calls for the continent to stand on its own feet after tensions over Greenland.
US President Donald Trump roiled the transatlantic alliance by threatening to seize the autonomous Danish territory — before backing off after talks with Rutte last week.
The diplomatic crisis sparked gave fresh momentum to those advocating for Europe to take a tougher line against Trump and break its military reliance on Washington.
“If anyone thinks here again, that the European Union, or Europe as a whole, can defend itself without the US — keep on dreaming. You can’t,” Rutte told lawmakers at the European Parliament.
He said that EU countries would have to double defense spending from the five percent NATO target agreed last year to 10 percent and spend “billions and billions” on building nuclear arms.
“You would lose the ultimate guarantor of our freedom, which is the US nuclear umbrella,” Rutte said. “So hey, good luck.”
The former Dutch prime minister insisted that US commitment to NATO’s Article Five mutual defense clause remained “total,” but that the United States expected European countries to keep spending more on their militaries.
“They need a secure Euro-Atlantic, and they also need a secure Europe. So the US has every interest in NATO,” he said.
The NATO head reiterated his repeated praise for Trump for pressuring reluctant European allies to step up defense spending.
He also appeared to knock back a suggestion floated by the EU’s defense commissioner Andrius Kubilius earlier this month for a possible European defense force that could replace US troops on the continent.
“It will make things more complicated. I think Putin will love it. So think again,” Rutte said.
On Greenland, Rutte said he had agreed with Trump that NATO would “take more responsibility for the defense of the Arctic,” but it was up to Greenlandic and Danish authorities to negotiate over US presence on the island.
“I have no mandate to negotiate on behalf of Denmark, so I didn’t, and I will not,” he said.
Rutte reiterated that he had stressed to Trump the cost paid by NATO allies in Afghanistan after the US leader caused outrage by playing down their contribution.
“For every two American soldiers who paid the ultimate price, one soldier of an ally or a partner, a NATO ally or a partner country, did not return home,” he said.
“I know that America greatly appreciates all the efforts.”
