N. Koreans – Feds ‘mugged’ us at JFK

NORTH KOREA on Sunday claimed U.S. authorities had “literally mugged” members of its delegation at Kennedy Airport — ripping the United States as a “felonious and lawless gangster state.”

American officials “forcibly took away a diplomatic package from the delegation by an illegal and heinous act of provocation” on Friday, the dictatorship’s foreign ministry spokesman alleged to the state-run KCNA news agency.

As the North tells it, more than 20 U.S. officials “made a violent assault like gangsters” on North Korean diplomats heading home from a UN conference on the rights of people with disabilities.

“As the diplomats vigorously resisted, they grabbed the diplomatic package using physical violence and made off,” the foreign ministry spokesman said.

Department of Homeland Security disputed the account.

“According to the U.S. State Department, the North Korean citizens were not accredited members of North Korea’s Mission to the UN and had no entitlement to diplomatic immunity,” Homeland Security spokesman David Lapan said. “The package in question had no diplomatic protection from inspection.

“DHS seized multiple media items and packages from the individuals, at which time the North Koreans attempted to physically retrieve the items but were prevented from doing so by DHS officers,” Lapan said. “The reported aggression was initiated by the North Koreans.”

The travelers were released but refused to board their plane without their seized items, he said.

In light of the alleged incident, the North urged the international community to rethink whether New York was “fit to serve as the venue for international meetings.”

Tensions and combative rhetoric between the U.S. and North Korea have ratcheted up since President Trump took office in January. STERLING, Va. — Police in Virginia charged a 22-yearold man with killing a teenager who was reported missing after she and her friends left a mosque early Sunday.

Fairfax County police charged Darwin Martinez Torres of Sterling with murder after they found what they believe is the 17-yearold girl’s body in a pond Sunday afternoon.

Police spokeswoman Tawny Wright said the girl had been walking with friends when she got into a dispute with a man in a car early Sunday. The man assaulted her and she became separated from her friends.

The Washington Post identified the teen as Nabra Hassanen of Reston.

The teenager had been participating in at a sleepover at the All Dulles Area Muslim Society.

Police said they looked into whether the murder was a hate crime, but said they’ve found no evidence it was.