General North Korea thread

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K. A. Pital
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Re: General North Korea thread

Post by K. A. Pital »

mr friendly guy wrote:Now for some levity

http://www.9news.com.au/world/2016/11/1 ... ong-un-fat
November 16, 2016
North Korea asks China to stop calling Kim Jong-un fat

TBA
North Korea has reportedly made an official request to state officials in China pleading with them to stop referring to Kim Jong-un as fat.

Kim Fatty III is a popular nickname for the North Korean leader in neighbouring China.

Other popular nicknames include Jin Pang Pang (Kim Fat Fatty) and Jin San Fei (Kim Abundant III).

North Korean government officials are terrified the leader will find out about the insults and look for someone to blame, according to Hong Kong's Apple Daily.

It comes as no surprise that North Korean officials fear the wrath of their dictator, with many who have fallen foul of Kim Jong-un finding themselves on the opposite end of a military firing line.

Kim Jong-un is believed to have piled on 38kg in recent years due to his love of Swiss cheese, whiskey and scallops, according to The Sun.

© Nine Digital Pty Ltd 2016
According to some Chinese netizens, a lot of these humourous names are used for world leaders. So Kim getting this treatment is no different. Although they aren't used for official correspondence.
I just hope the Chinese think strategically and keep feeding Fatty McFat Face with stuff that will make him even fatter. Then he dies and some pro-Chinese generals come to power. DPRK ends. :P
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Re: General North Korea thread

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Yeah, I'd be sending cases of deep-fried scallops and Maker's Mark as diplomatic gestures of goodwill if I was China. :D

To be fair, I also love both of those thi- *ulp!* I think I just threw up in my mouth a little.

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Re: General North Korea thread

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Deep fried scallops? Hole-punched bits of stingray more like.

I'd go with a couple large shipments of Spam, personally.
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Re: General North Korea thread

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Elheru Aran wrote:Deep fried scallops? Hole-punched bits of stingray more like.
I come from the northeast Atlantic coast. I can tell the difference. Stingray lacks the flavor and flaky texture.

Deep-fried scallops are terrible for you, but so delicious, especially if you wrap them in bacon (on both counts).

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Re: General North Korea thread

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Well if Family Guy is anything to go by, just showing him the cover of News of the World will be enough to get rid of him. :lol:
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Re: General North Korea thread

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Raw Shark wrote:Yeah, I'd be sending cases of deep-fried scallops and Maker's Mark as diplomatic gestures of goodwill if I was China. :D
Any objections if us Scots contribute one of our newest delicacies, the deep fried Mars bar?

(No, I haven't eaten one — I'm trying to lose a few pounds, not put on another fifty or so...)
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Re: General North Korea thread

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Apparently China is now censoring some of the Kim insults, but not others. Why bother if you're not going to do them all? Maybe its some sort of cheap attempt at buying off North Korea.

The alternative is, the Chinese government has a thing against fat shaming. :D
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Re: General North Korea thread

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And it appears the Fat Man's brother, the former heir apparent before getting caught at Tokyo Disneyland and critic of the regime has been assassinated.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world ... 79336.html
Kim Jong-un's half-brother 'assassinated by two female agents using poisoned needles' in Malaysia
Reports say two assassins escaped in a taxi and remain at large

North Korean leader Kim Jong-un's brother has been assassinated in Malaysia, South Korean media reports.

Kim Jong-nam was killed at Kuala Lumpur airport after being attacked by two women with "poisoned needles," according to local TV reports.

The two women, believed to be North Korean agents, escaped in a taxi and remain at large, TV Chosun reported.

Yonhap News, citing a South Korean government source, also reported Mr Kim had been killed.

Malaysian police told Reuters an unidentified North Korean man died en route to hospital from a Kuala Lumpur airport.

The police said the man's identity had not been verified.

An employee in the emergency ward of Putrajaya hospital told the agency a deceased Korean there was born in 1970 and surnamed Kim.

A source close to the Malaysian Prime Minister's office confirmed Mr Kim's death to the BBC, adding that his body was now undergoing an autopsy.

Mr Kim went into hiding in Malaysia after the execution in December 2013 of his uncle, Jang Song-thaek, the once-powerful uncle of the current leader.

He was known to spend a significant time outside the country and had spoken out publicly against his family's dynastic control of the isolated state

The eldest son of Kim Jong-il, he survived an assassination attempt in Macau in 2011.

Mr Kim was born from his father's non-marital relationship with Sung Hae-rim, a South Korean-born actress who died in Moscow.

While he was widely seen as the hermit kingdom's heir apparent, he fell out of favour after being detained while trying to enter Japan on a forged passport.

He told authorities he wanted to visit Disneyland with his family.

North and South Korea are yet to officially comment on the reports.

If confirmed, Mr Kim's case would mark the most high-profile death under the Kim Jong-un regime since the execution of Jang Song-thaek.
Poisoned needles? :shock: Ok, the KGB assassinated a critic using ricin via an umbrella which shoots pellets, so I guess its not that far out of the ordinary.
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Re: General North Korea thread

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Two women with poison needles in a Malaysian airport is still some James Bond shit, let's not let this kind of thing become the new normal, I'm begging you.

Even the voluntary exiles are getting whacked now? Man, Jong-un is cleaning house like a maid. My crystal ball is seeing a coup in his future. Either that, or he'll have to kill the second-to-last North Korean who has any kind of authority (y'know, the Chief Dog Catcher or something) himself.

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Re: General North Korea thread

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I see someone as isolated from reality as that, and I'm more concerned about the people around him running the place.

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Re: General North Korea thread

Post by mr friendly guy »

Khaat wrote:I see someone as isolated from reality as that, and I'm more concerned about the people around him running the place.

"I have no idea what to get my half-brother for his birthday. Chou, you know what he likes: get him something really good. Like two girls at once, or something."
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Personally I would have thought the brother would have liked a trip to Florida's Disneyworld. If he likes Japanese Disneyland, he would love the much, much larger Disneyworld. :D

On a more serious note, how detached is Kim from reality? My impression is there is method to his madness. That is the people he got rid of, were political opponents, as opposed to loyal people who just didn't agree with him 100%.
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Re: General North Korea thread

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More details on why he had to go. Apparently it might be poison spray. We will have to see as the evidence comes in

http://www.news.com.au/lifestyle/real-l ... 3fdcaae8a3
The fallen son: Playboy life of Kim Jong-un’s older brother

IT HAS all the hallmarks of a Hollywood spy film.
An exiled son is killed in the middle of a busy airport while rumours swirl about his potential killer - or killers - and whether it was orchestrated by his own government.
The oldest brother of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un is dead and fingers are already pointing towards the regime.
Regarded as the Kim family’s troublesome playboy brother, Kim Jong-nam was assassinated at an airport in Malaysia on Monday, a senior official told AFP.
He was reportedly sprayed with a liquid in the shopping concourse of Kuala Lumpur’s airport and sought help at an information counter, complaining of pain and stinging eyes.
Multiple South Korean media reports, citing unidentified sources, said Kim Jong-nam was killed by two women, believed to be North Korean agents who fled in a taxi.
District police chief Abdul Aziz Ali confirmed a North Korean man, later named as Kim Jong-nam but travelling under the name of Kim Chol, was waiting for a flight to Macau when he was attacked.
South Korea confirmed Kim Jong-nam was murdered, AFP reported.
But who is Kim Jong-nam, and why is his death important?

THE FALLEN SON
Born in 1971, Kim Jong-nam was the eldest son of then current leader Kim Jong-il and actress Song Hye-rim.
He is the half brother of Kim Jong-un, who shares the same father.
Not a lot is known about the eldest Kim and his upbringing, but it is believed his grandfather and founding president Kim Il-sung disapproved of his son’s relationship with Kim Jong-nam’s mother, according to the Washington Post.
Kim Jong-il wanted to keep his affair with Song a secret due to his father’s disapproval and he initially kept Jong-nam out of school.
As a boy he was initially sent to live with Song’s older sister Song Hye-rang, who tutored him at home, but he left North Korea in 1979 and lived with his grandmother in Moscow.
Kim Jong-nam later attended international schools in Russia and Switzerland before returning home to North Korea in 1988.
Things turned sour in 2001 when he was caught trying to enter Japan on a fake passport, revealing he wanted to visit Disneyland and using a Chinese alias that translated to “fat bear”.
The move was widely seen as an embarrassment to his father and pushed him further out of favour.
It is also understood he lived in Macau for some time, and had homes in Beijing and Singapore.

WHY HE ‘HAD TO GO’
Although there was little evidence that Kim Jong-nam was plotting against the North Korean leader, he provided an alternative for those who want to see leadership change.
Exiled from the country by his father, he lived in Macau until his father died in 2011, according to UK newspaper The Telegraph.
He went into hiding reportedly out of fear that his own half-brother saw him as a direct threat to legitimacy of his regime.


According to South Korean newspaper Chosun Ilbo, Kim Jong-nam had previously worked for North Korea’s foreign ministry where his focus was on resolving disputes with Tokyo.
Kim Jong-nam was apparently given the role by his leader brother as a way of keeping his enemies close.
In a 2015 interview, Toshimitsu Shigemura, a professor at Tokyo’s Waseda University, told The Telegraph he believed this move was strategic in more ways than one.
“I expect Kim Jong-un summoned Kim Jong-nam back to Pyongyang and gave him a job as he is still relatively weak and feared that other factions might support Kim Jong-nam,” he said.
“It is also possible that China is looking for an alternative North Korean leader and could have thrown their support behind another member of the Kim family.”
Mark Tokola, vice president at the Korea Economic Institute in Washington, said it would be surprising if Kim Jong-nam was not killed on the orders of his brother, given that North Korean agents have reportedly tried to assassinate Kim Jong-nam in the past.
“It seems probable that the motivation for the murder was a continuing sense of paranoia on the part of Kim Jong-un, which may be a well-placed paranoia,” Mr Tokola wrote in a commentary.

A NATURAL LEADER?
While many assumed as the eldest son, Kim jong-nam was the natural heir, Kim Jong-un’s aunt told The Washington Post last year that wasn’t the case at all.
According to Ko Yong Suk the current leader was chosen as successor in the early 1990s, when he was only eight years old.
In an interview with Japanese newspaper Tokyo Shimbun Kim Jong-nam admitted he had become distant from his father,
“After I went back to North Korea following my education in Switzerland, I grew further apart from my father because I insisted on reform and market-opening and was eventually viewed with suspicion,” he said.
Many hoped the elder Kim would bring reform to a country which had been ruled by the same family for generations.
In an interview given to Japanese media in 2010, the reclusive Kim Jong-nam spoke of how he was opposed to hereditary succession, telling broadcaster Asahi he wasn’t up for the top job.
“Personally I am against third-generation succession,” he said.
“I hope my younger brother will do his best for the sake of North Koreans’ prosperous lives.”
However in a 2012 book, My Father, Kim Jong-il and Me, he was quoted as saying his younger half-brother lacked leadership qualities, the BBC reveals.

ATTEMPTS ON LIFE
If it is proved Kim Jong-nam was murdered, it wouldn’t be the first time an attempt was made on his life.
According to The Telegraph, in 2011 he survived an assassination attempt in Macau.
The following year, a North Korean spy was jailed in South Korea after he admitted trying to organise a hit-and-run targeting Kim Jong-nam.
While the most likely explanation for the killing was that Kim Jong-un was removing a potential challenger to North Korean leadership within his own family, it could also be about sending a warning to North Korean officials to demonstrate the reach of his regime.
Evans Revere, a former US diplomat and specialist on East Asia, said the killing did not mean the North Korean regime was unstable but rather showed Kim Jong-un’s brutal control and ability to eliminate opponents or perceived opponents.
But Victor Cha, a former White House director for Asian affairs, disagreed.
“He sacks the minister of state security last month and now kills the elder brother. Doesn’t look so stable to me,” Mr Cha said.

INTERNATIONAL PLAYBOY
According to the BBC, the eldest Kim was a fan of poker machines in Macau, with the Chinese territory being famous for gambling.
But the slot machines were not his only vice.
Kim Jong-nam also apparently had a way with the ladies and was said to enjoy the women in Macau, GQ reveals.
“Jong-nam was the only Kim family member to speak with foreign media, and the closest the country ever had to an international playboy,” Nimrod Kamer writes.

South Korean newspaper The Chosun Ilbo reported that Kim Jong-nam had two wives, at least one mistress, and several children.
His first wife, Shin Jong-hui, is said to live in the northern outskirts of Beijing. His second wife, Lee Hye-kyong and their son Han-sol and their daughter Sol-hui, reportedly live in a modest 12-storey apartment building in Macau. His mistress, former Air China flight attendant Chen Jia-Xi, also lives in Macau.

HIDING IN MALAYSIA

Kim Jong-nam went into hiding in Malaysia after the execution of his uncle Jang Song-thaek, according to The Sun.
It is understood he was close to his uncle, who was North Korea’s second most powerful man before being executed on Kim Jong-un’s orders in 2013.

The year before, Kim Jong-nam reportedly said that the Chinese government was monitoring him and spoke about his fate.
The Chinese government is protecting me, but it is also monitoring me too. It’s my inevitable fate,” he said. “If you can’t avoid it, it’s better to enjoy it.”
— with AFP and AP
Interesting look at the playboy brother. Although if he felt China was protecting him, running to Malaysia most probably isn't a good idea as there is no incentive for Malaysia to look out for him.
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Re: General North Korea thread

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Apparently the North Koreans are wanting his body released without performing a post-mortem, the Malaysians are having none of it! :lol:
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Re: General North Korea thread

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I'm sure they will grandstand about it being an act of war to investigate the cause of death.
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Re: General North Korea thread

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they have some suspects
Long article so I will post the pertinent parts
Malaysian police arrested a second woman Thursday in the death of Kim Jong Nam, the half brother of North Korea’s leader who was reportedly poisoned this week by two female assassins as he waited for a flight in Malaysia.
Police chief Khalid Abu Bakar confirmed the latest arrest to the national Bernama news agency and said a statement would be released soon. Investigators are trying to shed light on a death that set off set off waves of speculation over whether North Korea dispatched a hit squad to kill a man known for his drinking, gambling and complicated family life.
Medical workers completed an autopsy late Wednesday, but it was not immediately clear if or when Malaysia would release the findings publicly. North Korea had objected to the autopsy and asked for Kim Jong Nam’s body to be returned; Malaysia went ahead with the procedure anyway as the North did not submit a formal protest, said Abdul Samah Mat, a senior Malaysian police official.

Also Wednesday, police arrested the first suspect in the case, a woman carrying Vietnamese travel documents bearing the name Doan Thi Huong. She was picked up at the budget terminal of Kuala Lumpur International Airport, where Kim Jong Nam fell ill on Monday morning. It was not immediately clear whether the passport was genuine.
She was identified using earlier surveillance video from the airport, police said.
Still photos of the video, confirmed as authentic by police, showed a woman in a skirt and long-sleeved white T-shirt with “LOL” emblazoned across the front. Kim Jong Nam, who was 45 or 46, was estranged from his younger brother, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, and had been living abroad for years. He reportedly fell out of favour when he was caught trying to enter Japan on a false passport in 2001, saying he wanted to visit Tokyo Disneyland.

According to two senior Malaysian government officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the case involves sensitive diplomacy, the elder Kim died en route to a hospital on Monday after suddenly falling ill at the airport’s budget terminal.
He told medical workers before he died that he had been attacked with a chemical spray at the airport, the Malaysian officials said. Multiple South Korean media reports, citing unidentified sources, said two women believed to be North Korean agents killed him with some kind of poison before fleeing in a taxi. Police said they were hunting for more suspects. No further details were released.
The NIS also cited a “genuine” attempt by North Korea to kill Kim Jong Nam in 2012, the politicians said. The NIS told them that Kim Jong Nam sent a letter to Kim Jong Un in April 2012, after the assassination attempt, begging for the lives of himself and his family.
The letter said: “I hope you cancel the order for the punishment of me and my family. We have nowhere to go, nowhere to hide, and we know that the only way to escape is committing suicide.”
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Re: General North Korea thread

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The plot thickens. Apparently the people accused deny being agents and claim they were paid to do this and assumed it was a reality television prank. Either this is one blatant lie or whoever did this just managed to outdo Loki and got an unsuspecting hands to kill someone.

link
A WOMAN suspected of being involved in the assassination plot of Kim Jong-un’s brother was reportedly offered just $100 to carry out the attack which she believed was a prank.
As Malaysian police detained a third person over the death of Kim Jong-nam, it has been revealed that the two women and four men allegedly involved didn’t know each other before being brought together to carry out the attack.
According to UK newspaperThe Telegraph, a Malaysian security source revealed the six suspects were all living in Kuala Lumpur and were recruited by a secret service agent.
Dean Thi Huong, 28, from Nam Dinh, Vietnam, was arrested on Wednesday at the airport budget­ departure hall where Kim Jong-nam was attacked.
Indonesian national Siti Aishah was taken into custody on Thursday.
A third person, understood to be Aishah’s boyfriend has also been detained and is not believed to be involved in the case but has provided details over his girlfriend’s arrest, The Telegraph reported.
Citing Indonesian news site Kumpuran, it reported Aisha had been approached in the nightclub where she worked in the Malaysian capital and was offered $100 to take part in the plot.

But like Doan, she told police she believed the stunt was part of a prank and she had no idea who Kim Jong-nam even was. The report has yet to be verified.

According to Kumpuran, Siti also thought the others were part of a film crew involved in a reality TV show.
It is understood Siti is a divorced mother-of-one who worked as a domestic worker in Jakarta before moving to Malaysia.
Indonesia’s foreign ministry has confirmed the arrest of a female national in connection with Kim Jong-nam’s death.

FIVE SECONDS TO DEATH
Meanwhile it emerged that it took just five seconds for Kim Jong-nam to die following the suspected poison attack.
One of the women stepped in front of him to distract him while the other came up behind with a dark glove on one hand and placed him in a chokehold before splashing him in the face with a spray, theNew Straits Times reported.

Kim Jong-nam quickly sought help at the airport clinic but died on route to hospital.
The attack was captured by several surveillance cameras in the busy departure terminal of Kuala Lumpur International Airport on Monday morning and showed one of the women hurrying down an escalator to escape.
The results of the autopsy could take up to a week to be released and will prove beyond doubt whether Kim Jong-nam was poisoned. Kim Jong-nam’s body will remain under police protection until then.
A source close to the post-mortem process at Kuala Lumpur Hospital told the New Straits Times that there were no puncture wounds on Kim Jong-nam’s body or face, which would make earlier reports that he was injected with a lethal poison less plausible.
He also told medical workers before he died that he had been attacked with a chemical spray.

THE SUSPECTS
South Korea claims female agents working for Pyongyang poisoned Kim Jong-nam as he was getting ready to board a flight to Macau.
According to the New Straits Times, one of the men suspected of being involved in the attack is believed to be a North Korean intelligence officer who disguised himself as a woman during the attack.
South Korea’s spy agency, the National Intelligence Service, said that the North had been trying for five years to kill Kim Jong-nam.

<snip the rest>
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Re: General North Korea thread

Post by Ziggy Stardust »

It seems unlikely that it's true, because what the hell kind of prank involves sneaking up on an elderly man, putting him in a chokehold, and then splashing liquid in his face? A chokehold just seems too clinical and violent to be sold as part of a prank. On the other hand, there are a lot of very stupid people out there, and part of me hopes that this is true simply because it would make such a fascinating story.
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Re: General North Korea thread

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Ziggy Stardust wrote:On the other hand, there are a lot of very stupid people out there, and part of me hopes that this is true simply because it would make such a fascinating story.
I dunno, when you compare this to some of the stunts NK is known to have done, it sounds almost sane, methodical and uncomplicated in comparison.

Can we invoke the meme for "truth is stranger than fiction; fiction has to make sense" yet...? Image
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Re: General North Korea thread

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The agent is VX nerve agent

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-39073837
Kim Jong-nam: How N Korea could have used potent VX to kill

Malaysian authorities have identified the toxin that killed Kim Jong-nam at Kuala Lumpur airport as VX, which is classified as a weapon of mass destruction. Bruce Bennett, a defence expert with the Rand Corporation, dissects how this could have happened.
VX is an extraordinarily potent chemical weapon. About 0.01g - less than a drop - on the skin can kill. The chemical goes through the skin and disrupts the nerve system.
It is an oil-like substance; it would normally not mix well with water. So the liquid sprayed or wiped on Kim Jong-nam likely did not contain the VX - that helps to explain why the women seen accosting him did not die despite getting the liquid on their hands.
Instead, a very small quantity of VX - a drop - was likely on the cloths used by the women to touch his face. But this would not have been easy by any means.

The perpetrators would have really wanted to practise with this to make sure the drop touched Kim, and that they did not touch the drop. And that is what we are told happened.
Police say that they are believed to have repeated this move in shopping malls ahead of the actual event on 13 February.

As the drop absorbed into Kim Jong-nam's skin, it would have started affecting his nerve system, causing effects like those reported. He would not have lived long.

t appears that the North Korean government may have felt that they could claim the body and avoid an autopsy, thus denying the outside world knowledge of what had happened.
Malaysia has proven diligent in insisting on an autopsy and clearly North Korea failed in its efforts to prevent this. This has led to a row between the two nations, Malaysia being one of few that had diplomatic relations with the North.
So how could the VX have actually gotten into Malaysia?

Because the quantity required to kill is extraordinarily small, it could have been smuggled into Malaysia in a cartridge in a pen or some such thing. The security forces would have had no idea it was being smuggled in unless someone had tipped them off, which clearly did not happen.
It is unlikely that VX was made in Malaysia - it is not something that can be made safely in a kitchen sink.
Of course, we don't know for sure that North Korea made it and it is also possible they may have purchased it from a third country. There is both a US and a Soviet/Russian version of VX and it will be interesting to see which version was eventually used.
It would take sophisticated laboratory analysis to tell them apart, which may already have beem done.
VX is extremely stable - like oil, it does not evaporate quickly. That made the VX safe on a cloth or some other surface until it touched human skin.

But this use of VX, unheard of previously, is a serious violation of international standards. The fact that it was used in a foreign country means that Malaysia and other countries will be both appalled and furious.
Of key importance will be how China responds. After all, China was reportedly providing protection for Kim Jong-nam.
If North Korea seriously violated international law, China should presumably do more than just cut off imports of North Korean coal.
China has the opportunity to punish North Korea and thereby hopefully deter it from carrying out this kind of attack again.
A broader Chinese trade embargo would hurt North Korea seriously.
This is James Bond stuff.
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K. A. Pital
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Re: General North Korea thread

Post by K. A. Pital »

This is Game of Thrones stuff. DPRK's politics are very similar to that show.
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Re: General North Korea thread

Post by LaCroix »

I'm kind of glad that the VX was applied via the cloth and not the spray. Imagine someone spraying Vx in a public airport.
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Re: General North Korea thread

Post by Mr Bean »

LaCroix wrote:I'm kind of glad that the VX was applied via the cloth and not the spray. Imagine someone spraying Vx in a public airport.
Well it would save on paying your agents but this is frigging clown shoes to use VX of all things to kill him. It's complicated, it raises questions on how they got it in country because unless it was domestic believe you me there are some smugglers on the boarders taking a long look at retirement locations for helping the NK's get that in country.

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Re: General North Korea thread

Post by Broomstick »

LaCroix wrote:I'm kind of glad that the VX was applied via the cloth and not the spray. Imagine someone spraying Vx in a public airport.
Spraying VX is a good way for your assassins to get killed along with the target, that shit is toxic as hell in the teeniest amounts. Granted, you can find suicide-murderers, but the pool of potential assassins is much larger when you aren't expecting them to kill themselves to get the job done.

Keeping it on a cloth to apply minimizes the hazards to the the person(s) applying it.
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Re: General North Korea thread

Post by LaCroix »

Easy done. Give them a pill and tell then to take it half an hour earlier, it's the antidote.

What should they do? Google it?
A minute's thought suggests that the very idea of this is stupid. A more detailed examination raises the possibility that it might be an answer to the question "how could the Germans win the war after the US gets involved?" - Captain Seafort, in a thread proposing a 1942 'D-Day' in Quiberon Bay

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Re: General North Korea thread

Post by K. A. Pital »

LaCroix wrote:Easy done. Give them a pill and tell then to take it half an hour earlier, it's the antidote.

What should they do? Google it?
More casualties = unprofessional work of special services. It has long been a defining mark of a "cool" special services agent if they could design an assassination that would take out just the target with no collateral.

Probably the same reasoning. Some dude showing off his mad spy skillz.
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