CIA, Seoul Paid Hit-Man $300K to Kill North Korea's Leader, Ambassador Claims

The US and South Korean intelligence agencies handed over about 300,000 dollars to 'Kim', a North Korean citizen, to stage an alleged plot to assassinate North Korea's leader Kim Jong Un, the country's Ambassador to Russia said.

Speaking at a press conference in Moscow on Friday, North Korean Ambassador to Russia Kim Hyun Joong claimed that the US and South Korean intelligence agencies had handed over about 300,000 US dollars to 'Kim', a North Korean citizen, to assassinate North Korea's leader Kim Jong Un.

Kim Hyun Joong declined to reveal the full name of the failed hit-man, who was allegedly recruited by the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and South Korea's National Intelligence Service (NIS) in June 2014, when he worked at a logging enterprise in Russia's Khabarovsk Territory.

A covert assassination of the North Korean leader was allegedly to be carried out during a festival with the help of biochemical substances, such as radioactive or toxic agents "in the form of nanomaterials" which would allow the assassin to kill Kim Jong Un without approaching him.

N. Korea accuses CIA of attempting biochemical assassination plot against Kim Jong Un, with unusual specificity.https://t.co/iOz9Q0rmaL

— Jonathan Cheng (@JChengWSJ) 5 мая 2017 г.

"Once, they [the CIA and the South Korean intelligence service] handed this person $20,000 twice and a satellite reception-transmitter," the ambassador said.

According to him, Kim was threatened with reprisals against his family and upon returning to Pyongyang, he received instructions from South Korean intelligence via satellite.

Over the last year, Kim and his US and South Korean intelligence contacts had four conversations, during which the alleged assassin was offered several methods of accomplishing the task.

In the second half of 2016, Kim was allegedly tasked with creating a "communications control point abroad to safely supply equipment, materials and money." To this end, as well as to bribe the accomplices, he was sent another $200,000, Kim Hyun Joong said.

During a meeting in the Chinese border town of Dandong in March-April 2017, Kim received another $50,000 and a new satellite receiver-transmitter. By the end of April, preparation for the alleged assassination plot was wrapped up.

It was conducted on a top-secret basis in order to prevent a war on the Korean Peninsula. In total, Kim received more than 80 orders from South Korean intelligence services, according to the North Korean ambassador.

He pledged to find and "mercilessly destroy the alleged organizers of terror from the CIA and the NIS who dared to raise a hand to the top North Korean official."

Meanwhile, the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) reported on Friday that North Korea's intelligence services had allegedly named key suspects who they claimed were behind the planned attack on the country' leader Kim Jong Un, including NIS head Lee Byung-ho.

According to the news outlet, Pyongyang has named two other South Korean intelligence officers as well as Xu Guanghai from the company Qingdao Nazca Trade as suspects and demanded their extradition from whatever country they were currently residing in.

Pyongyang reportedly stressed that the suspects would be investigated under North Korean law, regardless of their citizenship.

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