North Korea on Friday accused the CIA and Seoul's intelligence services of conspiring to assassinate the isolated country's leader Kim Jong-Un with a biochemical weapon, amid heightened tensions in the region. In a statement the powerful ministry of state security, said it had foiled a "vicious plot" by a "hideous terrorists' group" to attack the North's "supreme leadership".
The accusations come with the US and North trading threats over the latter's nuclear and missile programmes, and as Washington considers whether to re-designate Pyongyang as a state sponsor of terrorism. That follows the killing of Kim's estranged half-brother Kim Jong-Nam by two women using the banned nerve agent VX at Kuala Lumpur international airport. Both Malaysia and South Korea have blamed the North for the assassination, which retorts that the accusations are an attempt to smear it.