Kim faces threat from ‘lone assassin’ … as he threatens South Korea president

A lone assassin from Kim Jong-Un’s inner circle is the most likely method by which the North Korean leader would be eliminated, according to new analysis. The killer might strike to put an end to his reign of terror, underlined by his violent purges among officials, an academic study has concluded. And while North Korea experts agreed assassination was “highly unlikely”, the research paper pointed out there had been attempts on the life of his predecessor and father, Kim Jong-Il. The paper by Sungmin Cho, from Georgetown University, also speculated Pyongyang reacted so angrily to the Hollywood comedy film, The Interview, because it had “the potential to inspire assassins” inside North Korea.

The lone assassin is most likely to be one of the regime’s top officials, not an unknown ordinary citizen, and the assassination is most likely to occur in a non-public situation like a banquet or secret meeting

Academic Sungmin Cho

Meanwhile, the North has said it has trained its military for an attack on the residence of South Korea’s president. It has warned of a “miserable end” facing Park Geun-Hye, with its artillery units standing ready to turn the presidential Blue House in Seoul into a “sea of flames and ashes”. On Friday, the country’s official news agency said Mr Kim took that warning a step further by ordering and personally monitoring a live-fire exercise involving the same target. Ms Park, meanwhile, countered by accusing her Northern counterpart of leading his country down an ultimately destructive path.

Artillery shells flew like lightning and intensely and fiercely struck targets simulating Cheong Wa Dae (Blue House) and rebel governing bodies in Seoul

North’s official KCNA news agency report on the Blue House exercise

kim jong-un