SEOUL/KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysian police on Wednesday detained a woman holding Vietnam travel papers and are looking for a “few” other foreign suspects in connection with the assassination of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un’s estranged half-brother, police said.
Lawmakers in South Korea had earlier cited their spy agency as saying it suspected two female North Korean agents had murdered Kim Jong Nam, and US government sources also told Reuters they believed North Korean assassins were responsible.
The portly and gregarious Kim Jong Nam, the eldest son of late North Korean leader Kim Jong Il, was assaulted on Monday morning in the departure hall of Kuala Lumpur International Airport and died on the way to hospital, Malaysian police said.
The woman detained at Kuala Lumpur airport was identified from CCTV footage at the airport and was alone when she was apprehended, police said in a statement.
Media had earlier published a grainy CCTV-captured image of a young woman wearing a white shirt with the letters “LOL” on the front.
Documents she carried were in the name of Doan Thi Huong, showed a birth date of May 1998 and birthplace of Nam Dinh, Vietnam, police said.
“Police are looking for a few others, all foreigners,” Deputy Inspector-General Noor Rashid Ibrahim told Reuters, declining to give their nationalities or gender.
South Korean intelligence believes Kim Jong Nam was poisoned, the lawmakers in South Korea’s capital, Seoul, said.
The spy agency told them that the young and unpredictable North Korean leader had issued a “standing order” for his half-brother’s assassination, and that there had been a failed attempt in 2012.
“The cause of death is strongly suspected to be a poisoning attack,” said South Korean lawmaker Kim Byung-kee, who was briefed by the spy agency.
Kim had been at the airport’s budget terminal to catch a flight to Macau on Monday when someone grabbed or held his face from behind, after which he felt dizzy and sought help at an information desk, Malaysian police official Fadzil Ahmat said.
According to South Korea’s spy agency, Kim Jong Nam had been living, under Beijing’s protection, with his second wife in the Chinese territory of Macau, the lawmakers said. One of them said Kim Jong Nam also had a wife and son in Beijing.
Kim had spoken out publicly against his family’s dynastic control of the isolated state.
“If the murder of Kim Jong Nam was confirmed to be committed by the North Korean regime, that would clearly depict the brutality and inhumanity of the Kim Jong Un regime,” South Korean Prime Minister Hwang Kyo-ahn, who is also acting president, told a security meeting.
The meeting was called in response to Kim Jong Nam’s death, news of which first emerged late on Tuesday.
‘Sense of danger’
South Korea is acutely sensitive to any sign of instability in isolated North Korea, and is still technically in a state of war with its impoverished and nuclear-armed neighbor, which carried out its latest ballistic missile test on Sunday.
Malaysian police said Kim held a passport under the name Kim Chol, with a birth date that made him 46.
Kim Jong Nam was known to spend a significant amount of time outside North Korea, traveling in Macau and Hong Kong as well as mainland China, and has been caught in the past using forged travel documents.
His body was taken on Wednesday to a second hospital, where an autopsy was being performed. North Korean embassy officials had arrived at the hospital and were coordinating with authorities, police sources said.
There was no mention of Kim Jong Nam’s death in North Korean media.
In Beijing, a foreign ministry spokesman said China was aware of the reports and closely following developments.
Yoji Gomi, a Japanese journalist who wrote a 2012 book on Kim Jong Nam, said Kim’s media appearances, which increased around the time South Korean intelligence said he was targeted for assassination, may have been an attempt to protect himself.
“I now have the impression that even he may have had a sense of danger, so he began exposing himself in the media and stating his opinions to protect himself and counter North Korea,” Gomi told a talk show on Japan’s NTV.
North Korean agents have killed rivals abroad before.
South Korea’s spy agency said Kim Jong Nam wrote a letter to Kim Jong Un in 2012 asking that the lives of him and his family be spared, one of the lawmakers said.
“Kim Jong Un may have been worried about more and more North Korean elites turning against him after Thae Yong Ho defected to the South,” said Koh Yu-hwan, an expert on the North Korean leadership at Dongguk University in Seoul, referring to last year’s defection by North Korea’s deputy ambassador in London.
Numerous North Korean officials have been purged or killed since Kim Jong Un took power following his father’s death in 2011. Those include his uncle Jang Song Thaek, who was considered the country’s second most-powerful person and was believed to have been close to Kim Jong Nam.
Jang was executed on Kim Jong Un’s orders in 2013.
Malaysia detains woman, seeking others in connection with N.Korean murder
Malaysia detains woman, seeking others in connection with N.Korean murder
US nuclear missile program costs soar to around $160 billion, sources say
- Bloomberg reported earlier on Friday that the new price tag was around $141 billion with the Pentagon assessing modifications of construction and schedule
WASHINGTON: The cost of an Air Force program to replace aging nuclear missiles has ballooned to about $160 billion from $95.8 billion, three people familiar with the matter said, threatening to slash funding for other key modernization plans.
The project, now named the Sentinel intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) program, is designed and managed by Northrop Grumman Corp. and aims to replace aging Minuteman III missiles.
Its latest price tag has risen by around $65 billion since a 2020 cost estimate, according to a US official, an industry executive and a hill aide briefed on the matter. This may force the Pentagon to scale back the project’s scope or time frame, a second industry executive said.
Bloomberg reported earlier on Friday that the new price tag was around $141 billion with the Pentagon assessing modifications of construction and schedule.
Northrop Grumman declined to comment. The Pentagon did not comment on the figure, but said it expects to give a new cost estimate around Tuesday.
The new Sentinel cost estimate eclipses an increase to “at least” $131 billion that the Air Force made public in January.
That triggered the Nunn-McCurdy Act, a 1982 law that requires the Pentagon to formally justify to Congress the importance of a program whose unit acquisition costs have risen more than 25 percent above a baseline.
Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin is expected to deliver that notification next week.
Though Air Force leaders argue that Sentinel is crucial for maintaining America’s nuclear deterrent, the Pentagon asked industry to provide cost estimates on a service life extension program for the existing inventory of Minuteman III missiles, according to documents seen by Reuters.
Increased cost estimates are putting pressure on other Air Force priorities like the Next Generation Air Dominance fighter jet program, according to two of the sources.
Other programs potentially at risk include hypersonic weapons development, the B-21 bomber, and various space initiatives.
NATO leaders will vow to pour weapons into Ukraine for another year, but membership is off the table
NATO leaders will vow to pour weapons into Ukraine for another year, but membership is off the table
- Leaders hope to reassure Ukraine of their ongoing support and show Russia that they will not walk away
- Fears raised over decline in support for Ukraine as Russia-leaning politicians gain ground in their respective countries
BRUSSELS: NATO leaders plan to pledge next week to keep pouring arms and ammunition into Ukraine at current levels for at least another year, hoping to reassure the war-ravaged country of their ongoing support and show Russian President Vladimir Putin that they will not walk away.
US President Joe Biden and his counterparts meet in Washington for a three-day summit beginning Tuesday to mark the military alliance’s 75th anniversary as Russian troops press their advantage along Ukraine’s eastern front in the third year of the war.
Speaking to reporters Friday, NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said NATO’s 32 member countries have been spending around 40 billion euros ($43 billion) each year on military equipment for Ukraine since the war began in February 2022 and that this should be “a minimum baseline” going forward.
“I expect allies will decide at the summit to sustain this level within the next year,” Stoltenberg said. He said the amount would be shared among nations based on their economic growth and that the leaders will review the figure when they meet again in 2025.
NATO is desperate to do more for Ukraine but is struggling to find new ways. Already, NATO allies provide 99 percent of the military support it gets. Soon, the alliance will manage equipment deliveries. But two red lines remain: no NATO membership until the war is over, and no NATO boots on the ground there.
At their last summit, NATO leaders agreed to fast-track Ukraine’s membership process — although the country is unlikely to join for many years — and set up a high-level body for emergency consultations. Several countries promised more military equipment.
A year on, they want to put on a fresh display of unity and resolve, even as uncertainty over elections roils many of the organization’s biggest members. The possible return of Donald Trump, who undermined trust among the allies while he was the US president, is a particular concern.
But governments in France and Germany also were weakened in elections this year. Italy is led by a prime minister whose party has neo-fascist roots, while an anti-immigrant party heads a shaky coalition in the Netherlands and Spain’s Cabinet relies on small parties to rule. The UK will have a new leader.
Whoever might be in power though, it’s become clear that there’s not a lot more that NATO can do.
Lately, Stoltenberg has insisted on a long-term commitment to Ukraine. Major funding delays, notably due to political wrangling in the US Congress, have left the country’s armed forces, in his words, “to defend themselves with one hand tied on the back.”
He had hoped the allies would agree to spend at least 40 billion euros annually on weapons in a “major, multi-year” program. It does not mean an increase in support, though. The figure roughly equals what they have already spent each year since the war began.
One new initiative the leaders are likely to endorse is a mission to get the right military equipment into Ukraine and streamline training for its armed forces. In their haste to help, Western backers have inundated Ukraine with all kinds of weapons and materiel.
In the early chaos of war, anything was welcome, but the deliveries have become unmanageable — a multitude of different kinds of vehicles or defense systems that require distinct maintenance plans and dedicated supply chains to keep them running.
Offers of training programs outside Ukraine have also been abundant, indeed so prolific and different that its armed forces struggle to prioritize which troops to send, to what NATO country, and for how long.
“We’ve let a thousand flowers bloom,” conceded a senior US State Department official, but added that with a new mission, probably based in Wiesbaden, Germany, and under the likely leadership of a US general, “NATO can come in and say: We’ve got it.”
The official requested anonymity to discuss plans that had not been finalized.
Sending military equipment via this new mission would also prevent rogue governments or leaders from meddling with joint deliveries. NATO officials say the mission would complement the US-led effort to drum up arms, the so-called Ramstein group.
The US will announce new steps to strengthen Ukraine’s air defenses and military capabilities, according to a senior Biden administration official.
The official, who spoke to reporters on the condition of anonymity under ground rules set by the White House, declined to detail the air defense capabilities that would be sent. But the administration signaled last month that the US will rush delivery of air defense interceptor missiles to Ukraine by redirecting planned shipments to other allied nations.
The official said members of the NATO-Ukraine Council would meet Thursday at the summit. Later that day, Biden and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky will host an event with leaders from nearly two dozen other nations who have negotiated and signed bilateral security agreements with Ukraine.
A conundrum for NATO leaders is how to frame Ukraine’s membership prospects without letting it join. Many allies refuse to allow Ukraine in while fighting continues, concerned about being dragged into a wider war with Russia. Hungary opposes Ukraine’s membership altogether.
In the run-up to the summit, NATO envoys have been weighing the use of words such as “irreversible” to describe Ukraine’s path to membership as they tweak language that has shifted constantly since they promised in 2008 that the country would join one day.
It’s unclear how this will be accepted in Kyiv. At their last meeting, the leaders were noncommittal about timing, saying only that they would be “in a position to extend an invitation to Ukraine to join the alliance when allies agree and conditions are met.”
Zelensky described it as “unprecedented and absurd when a time frame is set neither for the invitation nor for Ukraine’s membership.” He complained that “vague wording about ‘conditions’ is added even for inviting Ukraine.”
In recent weeks, Zelensky and other Ukrainian officials have been briefed on developments to avoid a repeat of the criticism. Stoltenberg said he and Zelensky agreed earlier this month that the new steps the leaders will take “constitute a bridge to NATO membership and a very strong package for Ukraine at the summit.”
Membership would protect Ukraine against a giant neighbor that annexed its Crimean Peninsula a decade ago and more recently seized vast swaths of land in the east and south. Before then, Kyiv must reform its security institutions, improve governance and curb corruption.
UK’s new PM Keir Starmer kills Rwanda plan on first day, Telegraph reports
- Newspaper was citing Labour sources, who called the plan “effectively dead”
LONDON: Britain’s newly elected Prime Minister Keir Starmer has killed off a deportation plan that would see migrants who arrived in the UK illegally sent to Rwanda on his first day on the job, the Telegraph reported on Friday.
The newspaper was citing Labour sources, who called the plan “effectively dead.”
Starmer had earlier promised to scrap the Conservative’s policy of sending asylum seekers to Rwanda, but with migration a key electoral issue, he will be under pressure himself to find a way to stop tens of thousands of people arriving across the Channel from France on small boats.
‘Astonished’ Germany says Hungary canceled foreign minister meeting
- The German ministry said it was “astonished” and that a “serious and honest” discussion was needed
- The Moscow meeting was the first meeting of an EU leader with Putin
FRANKFURT: Hungary has canceled a meeting for Monday in Budapest with Germany’s foreign minister and her Hungarian counterpart, a German foreign ministry official said on Friday.
The German ministry said it was “astonished” and that a “serious and honest” discussion was needed after Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban met Russian President Vladimir Putin on Friday.
The Hungarian foreign ministry and a government spokesperson didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.
The Moscow meeting was the first meeting of an EU leader with Putin in Moscow since April 2022, two months after Moscow launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
The talks angered some European Union leaders who warned against appeasing Moscow and said Orban did not speak for the EU.
The German foreign ministry official said that the meeting would be rescheduled.
Russian strikes kill 7, wound dozens in east Ukraine
- Moscow has centered its firepower on the industrial region
- Two Russian strikes on the town of Selydove, which lies close to the front where Moscow’s forces are advancing, killed at least five and injured eight
KYIV: Multiple Russian attacks killed at least seven and wounded more than two dozen others in the eastern Donetsk region of Ukraine on Friday, officials said.
Moscow has centered its firepower on the industrial region, which it claims to have annexed and has been partially controlled by Kremlin-backed forces since 2014.
Russian-installed officials also said Ukrainian shelling killed five people on its side of the front line in the Donetsk region.
Two Russian strikes on the town of Selydove, which lies close to the front where Moscow’s forces are advancing, killed at least five and injured eight, regional governor Vadym Filashkin said.
“Russians dropped two guided aerial bombs on the town,” he said in a statement on Telegram.
The regional prosecutor’s office said the strikes were an hour apart and used cluster munitions and a glide bomb.
A 32-year-old woman was killed and 20 others were wounded by Russian shelling in the town of Komar, damaging homes, shops, and an administrative building, Filashkin also said.
And one person was killed and another was wounded in a Russian Smerch rocket attack on the town of Ukrainsk.
“It is dangerous to stay here, as well as in the rest of Donetsk region,” he wrote on social media.
Further north in the Donetsk region, Russian forces are pushing toward the hilltop settlement of Chasiv Yar.
Images distributed by Ukrainian forces show rows of destroyed and smoldering Soviet-era housing blocks in the town.
Denis Pushilin, the Moscow-installed official of the Donetsk region, said five people were killed in various Ukrainian attacks on territory that Russia controls.
Russia claimed to have annexed the Donetsk region in 2022, even though its forces do not have full control of the area.
In Moscow, Russian President Vladimir Putin told Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban that Ukraine must abandon four regions in the east and south — including Donetsk — if Kyiv wants peace.
