North Korean leader’s sister accuses US of ‘gangster-like’ hypocrisy over failed spy satellite launch

Kim Yo Jong, the sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, on Thursday accused the U.S. of “gangster-like” hypocrisy for its criticisms of North Korea’s failed attempt to launch a military spy satellite. 

Kim Yo Jong said the U.S. “is letting loose a hackneyed gibberish prompted by its brigandish and abnormal thinking,” knocking the country for criticizing North Korea’s satellite plans when it has launched satellites of its own. 

“The far-fetched logic that only the DPRK should not be allowed to do so according to the [U.N. Security Council’s] ‘resolution’ which bans the use of ballistic rocket technology irrespective of its purpose, though other countries are doing so, is clearly a gangster-like and wrong one of seriously violating the DPRK’s right to use space and illegally oppressing it,” she said in a statement broadcast on state media.

North Korea admitted Wednesday it tried and failed to launch a spy satellite. The country planned to do so to monitor what it labeled “reckless” military exercises by the U.S. and South Korea in the region.

The Biden administration earlier in the week condemned North Korea for the plans. 

“The United States strongly condemns the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) for its launch using ballistic missile technology, which is a brazen violation of multiple UN Security Council resolutions, raises tensions, and risks destabilizing the security situation in the region and beyond,” National Security Council spokesperson Adam Hodge said in a statement. 

Kim Yo Jong said Thursday “it is certain that the DPRK’s military reconnaissance satellite will be correctly put [into] space orbit in the near future and start its mission.”

The Associated Press contributed.