Police: 2 in N. Korean death coated hands with poison

The two women suspected of fatally poisoning a scion of North Korea’s ruling family were trained to coat their hands with toxic chemicals, then wipe them on his face, police in Malaysia said Wednesday, announcing they were seeking a North Korean diplomat.

But the North Korean Embassy ridiculed the police account of Kim Jong Nam’s death, demanding the immediate release of the two “innocent women” and saying there was no way they could have poisoned him. It alleged the women daubed liquid on Kim “for a joke.”

If the toxins had been on their hands “then how is it possible that these female suspects could still be alive?” demanded a statement from North Korea’s embassy in Kuala Lumpur. Police say the women — one of them Indonesian, the other Vietnamese — washed their hands soon after poisoning Kim, the long-estranged half-brother of the North Korean ruler.