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KUALA LUMPUR: A bus just entered the North Korean embassy here.
The vehicle entered the complex around 9:10 a.m. on Sunday (March 21), passing a police checkpoint in front of the embassy.
It is believed to have been chartered to transport embassy staff and their families to the airport.
This follows Malaysia denouncing North Korea’s decision to sever diplomatic ties and, in an immediate response, ordered all diplomatic personnel and their dependents at the Pyongyang embassy in Kuala Lumpur to leave the country this weekend.
In a strongly worded statement on Friday (March 19), Wisma Putra described North Korea’s unilateral decision to sever ties as “hostile and unconstructive” and as going against the “spirit of mutual respect and good neighborly relations. among members of the international community “. community”.
“The Malaysian government is now forced by the decision of the DPRK (Democratic People’s Republic of Korea) to close the embassy in Pyongyang, the operation of which has been suspended since 2017.
“At the same time, the government will issue an order for all diplomatic personnel and their dependents at the embassy in Malaysia to leave Malaysia within 48 hours from today,” the Foreign Ministry said.
There are understood to be 33 North Koreans, including relatives of diplomatic employees, at the embassy.
This comes after North Korea’s state media KCNA reported that it would sever diplomatic relations with Malaysia after a Kuala Lumpur court ruled earlier this month the extradition of one of its citizens, Mun Chol-myong. , to the United States to face money laundering charges.
The report indicated that the North Korean Foreign Ministry had warned that Washington would pay a price for its shares.
Mun was arrested in 2019 after the United States accused him of laundering funds through front companies and issuing fraudulent documents to support illicit shipments to North Korea.
He opposed the extradition request, arguing that it was politically motivated.
The North Korean Ministry of Foreign Affairs described the extradition as a “nefarious act and an unforgivable crime” by the Malaysian authorities, who had “offered our citizen as a sacrifice of the hostile movement of the United States in defiance of the recognized international laws “.
The report said Malaysia’s actions had destroyed “the entire foundation of bilateral relations based on respect for sovereignty.”
Malaysia and North Korea were previously embroiled in a diplomatic dispute after North Korean leader Kim Jong-un’s estranged brother, Kim Jong-nam, was assassinated at the Kuala Lumpur International Airport in Sepang in February 2017.
The incident occurred when two foreign women allegedly smeared his face with a VX nerve agent that was listed as a weapon of mass destruction by the United Nations.
After that, Malaysia suspended operations at its embassy in Pyongyang after ensuring the safe return of nine citizens detained within its embassy compound, in exchange for the release of Jong-nam’s body and the release of three of its diplomats. based in Kuala Lumpur.
Diplomatic relations appeared to be improving with the calm of the Pakatan Harapan federal government in 2018, but it did not fully materialize.
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