Kuala Lumpur - A Vietnamese woman who spent
more than two years in a Malaysian prison on suspicion of
killing the half-brother of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un was
freed on Friday, her lawyer said.
Doan Thi Huong, 30, was charged along with an Indonesian
woman with poisoning Kim Jong Nam by smearing his face with
liquid VX, a banned chemical weapon, at Kuala Lumpur airport in
February 2017.
Malaysian prosecutors dropped a murder charge against Huong
last month after she pleaded guilty to an alternate charge of
causing harm. Huong will return to Vietnam later on Friday, her
lawyer, Hisyam Teh, told Reuters.
Huong was taken into immigration custody immediately after
her release from a women's prison, and was believed to have been
taken to immigration headquarters in the administrative capital,
Putrajaya, where she will remain before boarding a flight to
Hanoi.
Teh said his client may speak at a brief news conference
before boarding her flight on Friday evening.
"In the event she is unable to talk to media I will read out
a statement from her," he said.
Huong's father, Doan Van Thanh, said he and her brother
would be in Hanoi to welcome her home.
"I am so happy now, my whole village is happy now," Thanh
told Reuters by telephone.
Kim Jong Nam, exiled half brother of North Korea's leader Kim Jong Un, in Narita, Japan. File picture: Shizuo Kambayashi/AP
"We will hold a party on Sunday and anyone can come and join
the party. We will slaughter some pigs for the party. My
daughter particularly likes fried fish, so we will prepare that
too," he said.
Huong's co-accused, Siti Aisyah, was freed in March after
prosecutors also dropped a murder charge against her.
South Korean and US officials have said the North Korean
regime had ordered the assassination of Kim Jong Nam, who had
been critical of his family's dynastic rule. Pyongyang has
denied the allegation.
Defence lawyers have maintained the women were pawns in an
assassination orchestrated by North Korean agents. The women
said they thought they were part of a reality prank show and did
not know they were poisoning Kim.
Four North Korean men were also charged but they left
Malaysia hours after the murder and remain at large.
Malaysia came under criticism for charging the two women
with murder - which carries a mandatory death penalty in the
Southeast Asian country - when the key perpetrators were still
being sought.