North Korea Repeats Claim It Thwarted U.S. Biochemical ‘Terror’ Plot in Pyongyang

Donald Trump and Kim Jong-un
Olivier Douliery/Pool via Bloomberg/Getty/AFP

A North Korean representative to the United Nations claimed in a state media article this week that Pyongyang successfully prevented the CIA from executing “a state-sponsored terrorism against our supreme headquarters using biological and chemical substance[s].”

The claim appeared in the state newspaper Rodong Sinmun on Monday as part of a larger article affirming North Korea’s alleged commitment to fighting terrorism and the state’s assertion that the United States is the greatest perpetrator of terrorist acts in the world.

The article claimed:

In May this year, a group of heinous terrorists who infiltrated into our country on the orders of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) of the U.S. and the south Korean puppet Intelligence Service with the purpose of carrying out a state-sponsored terrorism against our supreme headquarters using biological and chemical substance were caught and exposed.

It went on to say, “This palpably shows the true nature of the U.S. as the main culprit behind terrorism.”

Pyongyang had previously accused the CIA of a similar “assassination plot” in May, as Rodong Sinmun notes, declaring victory in thwarting the plot.

“International terrorism is not yet annihilated mainly because a particular country is using the ‘counter-terrorism’ agenda to seek its selfish political interests, gravely undermining world peace and security,” the “DPRK representative” claimed, adding:

Just like a chameleon changes its colors, the U.S. frequently changed the pretext of “counter-terrorism” and “non-proliferation” according to its need, and used them to overthrow legitimate governments in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Libya one by one by waging military attacks on those countries.

The unnamed representative quoted went on to define America’s war on terrorism as “a state terrorism with the purpose of regime change in countries that are not favorable to the U.S. and a new form of war of aggression that gives the humankind nothing but disaster and misfortune.”

The article claimed that the United States is conducting terrorist activity in Syria – without mentioning Syria’s status as a State Department-designated State Sponsor of Terrorism – and makes no mention of the largest country on that list, Iran, which continues to maintain diplomatic relations with North Korea.

Rodong Sinmun also failed to address the various terrorist acts committed throughout the half-century of the communist Kim regime’s existence, largely against South Korea and Japan. Several American congressmen, inspired by advocacy by the parents of North Korean victim Otto Warmbier, have launched a campaign to encourage the State Department to add North Korea to its list of state sponsors of terrorism.

North Korea celebrates the anniversary of the appointment of dictator Kim Jong-un’s father, Kim Jong-il, to the head of the Korean Workers’ Party on October 10. The Korean Central News Agency (KCNA), another national propaganda outlet, claimed Tuesday that fans of the rogue state held “meetings, book and photo exhibitions and film shows” around the world. On the other side of the border, North Korean defectors in the South launched a leaflet campaign into communist territory. According to the South Korean news agency Yonhap, an estimated 300,000 leaflets condemning Kim Jong-un and North Korea’s nuclear program flew into the country via air “balloon from a mountain in the western city of Gimpo near the border with the North around 6 a.m.”

“We flew the leaflets to condemn North Korea threatening the international community with missiles,” the head of the group, Park Sang-hak, told Yonhap. “As today is coincidently the founding anniversary of the North’s Workers’ Party, I hope these leaflets will serve as a warning to the North.”

American President Donald Trump is reportedly considering visiting the border between the two nations – the de-militarized zone (DMZ) – in November, when he is also expected to travel to South Korea and China. A U.S.-led diplomatic campaign has resulted in 20 countries around the world limiting or cutting off ties with Pyongyang since the Trump administration took office.

Follow Frances Martel on Facebook and Twitter.

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