13 May, 2017
A week after alleging that the US and South Korea had conspired to assassinate country's supreme leader, North Korea on Thursday asked Washington to hand over would-be killers.
"We urge the relevant authorities to immediately detect and arrest and hand over" the accused individuals, who were "targets of due heavy punishment", deputy Foreign Minister Han Song Ryol said in a statement carried the state-controlled media.
Selfies, coffee and a jacket were all that new South Korean President Moon Jae-in needed to powerfully project an image that he's a down-to-earth leader.
"I, too, aim to find a way to begin talks quickly between North and South Korea as well as the six-party talks", Moon said, referring to talks aimed at denuclearizing North Korea involving the United States, China, Japan, Russia and the two Koreas.
North Korea has a history of bombastic propaganda featuring unfounded claims. Mr. Moon has said he will review the deployment, though he insists he will fully consult with the United States before making any decision on this or any other North Korean matter.
Mr Moon was part of the South's last liberal government, which pursued a "Sunshine policy" of reconciliation and dialogue with the North, and is expected to shift away from Park's hardline approach.
The U.S. Senate would need to approve the new sanctions next, before they could be implemented.
Since North Korea's fifth nuclear test, the USA decision to deploy the THAAD missile defense system in South Korea and the inauguration of President Donald Trump, it's fair to say that the Korean Peninsula is in the gravest predicament it has been in for decades.
Koh Yu-hwan, a North Korea expert at Seoul's Dongguk University, said it's not unprecedented for the North to directly contact the US legislature or government.
On Thursday, the USA director of National Intelligence, Dan Coats, told the Senate Intelligence Committee that North Korea posed "a very significant, potentially existential threat to the United States that has to be addressed".
This image shows a military parade marking the 105th anniversary of the birth of late North Korean leader Kim Il-sung, in Pyongyang, on April 15, 2017.
"The CIA can never dodge its responsibility for having played a mastermind role in the crime", the North's Central Public Prosecutor's Office said, according to KCNA.
"We hope for Russian Federation to play a constructive role in order for North Korea to stop with its nuclear provocations and go the way of denuclearization", Moon was citing as saying to Putin in the 20-minute conversation.
The accusations came amid tensions over the North's nuclear and missile programmes and with Washington considering whether to re-designate Pyongyang as a state sponsor of terrorism.
North Korea's United Nations mission on Thursday said the plot was a "declaration of war".
The United States is negotiating with Pyongyang ally China on strengthening U.N. sanctions. Moon's plan to send a special envoy to China to resolve the THAAD issue and the North Korean nuclear issue is particularly significant.
