Malaysia to send Kim body to North Korea

PanARMENIAN.Net - The body of the assassinated half-brother of North Korea's leader will be sent to Pyongyang and nine Malaysians freed, Malaysia's prime minister said Thursday, March 30, ending a bitter feud between the two countries, AFP reports.

Kim Jong-Nam was poisoned with the lethal nerve agent VX in a brazen Cold War-style assassination on February 13 in Kuala Lumpur International Airport.

The murder triggered a diplomatic dispute between Malaysia and North Korea, which expelled each other's ambassadors and barred their citizens from leaving.

But a deal announced by Prime Minister Razak Najib and confirmed by North Korean state media said the two countries would lift their respective travel bans, and Kuala Lumpur would send the body to North Korea.

"... following the completion of the autopsy on the deceased and receipt of a letter from his family requesting the remains be returned to North Korea, the coroner has approved the release of the body," Najib said in a statement.

The nine Malaysians prevented from leaving North Korea "have now been allowed to return to Malaysia", he said, declaring later on Twitter that the "diplomatic crisis is over".

"They took off from Pyongyang today at 7:45 pm (1145 GMT) Malaysian time, and will land in Kuala Lumpur tomorrow around 5:00 am," he said in the statement that referred to Kim as "the deceased" rather than by name.

South Korea has blamed Pyongyang for the killing, citing what they say was a standing order from the North's leader Kim Jong-Un to kill his exiled and estranged half-brother.

But the North denies this and denounced Malaysia's investigation as an attempt to smear the secretive regime.

It had insisted that the man died of a heart attack and his body should be handed over to Pyongyang.