South Korea says the No. 2 official at the North Korean Embassy in London was the North’s most senior diplomat to defect to the South. This is the latest in a series of defections from Kim Jong Un’s state.
North Korea called the senior North Korean diplomat who defected earlier this week a criminal and “human scum”. It was the government’s first official response to the defection, Deutsche Welle reported.
The North’s official Korean Central News Agency, KCNA, accused Seoul of exploiting the defection of Thae Yong Ho for propaganda purposes, intended to embarrass the North’s leader.
The Pyongyang government also slammed the British government for disregarding international protocol and rejecting its demand to have Thae returned to North Korea and instead handing him over to the South Koreans.
Thae was formerly a minister at the North’s Embassy in London. He is believed to have worked there for about 10 years.
One of his main tasks was to counter the image of North Korea as a nuclear pariah state and notorious human rights abuser.
KCNA didn’t identify Thae by name, but said Pyongyang had ordered the “fugitive” to return to his country in June, where he was allegedly being investigated for a series of crimes, including embezzling government funds, leaking state secrets and sexually assaulting a minor.
The government mouthpiece said Thae “should have received legal punishment for the crimes he committed, but he discarded the fatherland that raised him and even his own parents and brothers by fleeing, thinking nothing but just saving himself, showing himself to be human scum who lacks even an elementary level of loyalty and even tiny bits of conscience and morality that are required for human beings.”
