North Korea angered by autopsies on Kim’s half brother
KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia — Malaysia performed a second autopsy on the estranged half brother of North Korea’s leader because the first procedure was inconclusive, piling on the intrigue surrounding what appeared to be an assassination at an airport in Kuala Lumpur, an official said Saturday. Police arrested a fourth suspect, identified as a North Korean man.
The second autopsy enraged North Korea, which has vowed to reject the results of any postmortem and demanded that Malaysia turn over the body immediately. Speaking to reporters outside the morgue late Friday, Pyongyang’s ambassador said Malaysian officials may be “trying to conceal something” and “colluding with hostile forces.”
A Malaysian official with knowledge of the investigation confirmed the second autopsy started Friday night and said that the results of the first were inconclusive. He asked that his name not be used because he is not authorized to speak to the media.
The inconclusive autopsy results raise all sorts of questions about the mysterious death of Kim Jong Nam, but a lingering sense of the unknown is not unusual when it comes to North Korea. While South Korea has blamed North Korea for a slew of assassinations or attempted killings in past decades, the North often denies involvement or simply doesn’t comment.
The death of Kim Jong Nam, the exiled half brother of North Korea’s mercurial ruler, has unleashed a torrent of speculation, and tales of intrigue.
Malaysia has arrested four people so far, the latest a man carrying an ID that identified him as 46-year-old Ri Jong Chol. He was picked up Friday night.
Kim Jong Nam, who was 45 or 46 and had lived in exile for years, fell ill at the Kuala Lumpur airport on Monday as he waited for a flight home to Macau. Dizzy and in pain, he told medical workers at the airport he had been sprayed with a chemical. He died while being taken to a hospital.
South Korea has accused its enemies in North Korea of dispatching a hit squad to kill Kim Jong Nam at the airport, saying two female assassins poisoned him and then fled in a taxi.
On Friday, Indonesia’s police chief said an Indonesian woman arrested for suspected involvement in the killing was duped into thinking she was part of a comedy show prank.
Indonesian police chief Tito Karnavian, citing information received from Malaysian authorities, told reporters in Indonesia’s Aceh province that Siti Aisyah, 25, was paid to be involved in Just for Laughs style pranks, a reference to a hidden camera show. He said she and another woman performed stunts which involved convincing men to close their eyes and then spraying them with water.
“Such an action was done three or four times and they were given a few dollars for it, and with the last target, Kim Jong Nam, allegedly there were dangerous materials in the sprayer,” Karnavian said. “She was not aware that it was an assassination attempt by alleged foreign agents.”