Pyongyang plan
Embassy break-in linked to shadowy organisation
Shadowy group said to be plotting to overthrow Kim
Days before US President Donald Trump was set to meet North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in Vietnam, a mysterious incident in Spain threatened to derail the entire high-stakes nuclear summit.
In broad daylight, masked assailants infiltrated North Korea’s Embassy in Madrid, restrained the staff with rope, stole computers and mobile phones, and fled in two luxury vehicles.
The group behind the late February operation is known as Cheollima Civil Defence, a secretive dissident organisation committed to overthrowing the Kim dynasty, people familiar with the planning and execution of the mission told the Washington Post.
The group’s alleged role in the attack has not previously been reported, and officials from the governments of North Korea, the United States, and Spain declined to comment on it.
But in recent days, rumours have swirled about the motivations behind the attack in the Spanish media, including a report in El Pais alleging that two of the masked assailants have ties to the CIA.
People familiar with the incident say the group did not act in coordination with any governments. American intelligence agencies would have been especially reluctant to do so given the mission’s sensitive timing and brazen nature. But the raid represents the most ambitious operation to date for an obscure organisation that seeks to undermine the North Korean regime and encourage mass defections, they say.
“This group is the first known resistance movement against North Korea, which makes its activities very newsworthy,” said Sung Yoon Lee, a North Korea expert at Tufts
University.
The identity of the assailants is a particularly sensitive topic given the delicate nature of Trump and Kim’s relationship.
Trump, who began his presidency by threatening the total annihilation of Kim and his country, has shifted to effusive praise for the young leader as he tries to convince him to give up his nuclear programme. But in the aftermath of the two leaders’ failed summit in Hanoi last month, tensions have re-emerged, with North Korea’s Vice-Foreign Minister threatening to suspend the denuclearisation talks.
Any hint of US involvement in an assault on a diplomatic compound could have derailed the talks, a prospect the CIA would likely be mindful of. “Infiltrating a North Korean embassy days before the nuclear summit would throw that all into jeopardy,” said Sue Mi Terry, a former Korea analyst at the CIA. “This is not something the CIA would undertake.” The agency declined to comment. According to Spanish media reports, the assailants tied up the embassy staff, put hoods over their heads and asked them a series of questions. They spoke in Korean and appeared to be Asian.
More than an hour into the raid, a woman reportedly escaped and her screams for help alerted a neighbour, who contacted the police. When authorities arrived at the embassy, a man opened the door and told them there was no problem. Moments later, the embassy gates opened, and the assailants dashed out to two embassy cars and sped away, according to local reports. The vehicles were abandoned and found on a nearby street.
While the incident has attracted a flurry of Spanish media attention, no police reports were filed by the embassy or the victims, according to the reports. Experts say the computers and phones seized in the raid amount to a treasure trove of information that foreign intelligence agencies are likely to seek out from the group.
The Cheollima group, which also goes by the name Free Joseon, first came to prominence in late 2017 after it successfully evacuated the nephew of Kim Jong Un from Macau after potential threats to his life surfaced. The nephew was the son of Kim Jong Nam, the North Korean leader’s exiled half-brother who was assassinated in a 2017 nerve gas attack in a Malaysian airport. Kim Jong Nam is widely believed to have been killed by the regime, making his son a likely target.
Members of the Cheollima group transported Kim Han Sol out of Macau with the help of the governments of the United States, China and the Netherlands, the group told the Wall Street Journal in 2017.