[WATCH] Women on trial for the murder of North Korea’s Kim Jong-nam revisit the scene

Suspects Siti Aisyah and Doan Thi Huong took part in a reconstruction of the crime, at Malaysia’s Kuala Lumpur airport to give trial participants 'a better perspective'

Siti Aisyah (left) and Doan Thi Huong were charged with the murder of Kim (Photo: CNN)
Siti Aisyah (left) and Doan Thi Huong were charged with the murder of Kim (Photo: CNN)

 

The two women who have been accused of killing Pyongyang leader’s half brother have toured the Malaysian airport, where the crime occurred.

The judge, defence lawyers, prosecutors and representatives from the women’s home countries were escorted inside the Kuala Lumpur airport by heavily armed police, in order to give the trial participants a better perspective of events as they unfolded.

The women, Indonesian Siti Aisyah and Vietnamese Doan Thi Huong, who have pleaded not guilty, were handcuffed and wearing bulletproof vests, as they moved around the airport premises.

Murdered Kim Jong-nam (Photo: BBC)
Murdered Kim Jong-nam (Photo: BBC)

High court judge Azmi Ariffin visited the check-in kiosk in the budget terminal where the two women allegedly smeared VX nerve agent onto Kim Jong-nam’s face on 13 February.

The judge followed the path Kim walked to the airport clinic, where he sought help after the attacked, and retraced the movement of the two women, who were seen on security footage rushing to restrooms afterwards to wash their hands.

Huong and Aisyah are the only two suspects detained in the brazen assassination of Kim, an outcast from North Korea’s ruling family who lived abroad in virtual exile for several years. The women’s defence lawyers have said that they were duped by suspected North Korean agents into believing that they were playing a harmless prank for a TV show.

Malaysia has never directly accused North Korea, but South Korea’s spy agency claimed that the attack was part of a five-year plot by North Korean leader Kim Jong-un to kill a brother, who he reportedly never met.

Kim Jong-nam was not thought to be seeking influence over his younger brother but had spoken out publicly against his family’s dynastic rule before.

Since the trial opened on 2 October, witnesses have testified that Kim died from acute VX poisoning. The banned chemical agent was reportedly found on his face and clothing, as well as on the women’s clothing and Huong’s fingernail clippings.