‘North Korea firing squad executes vice premier’

North Korea’s vice premier was executed by firing squad this year after showing discontent with the policies of the country’s leader Kim Jong Un, a South Korean media report said yesterday.

Yonhap News Agency cited an unnamed source as saying that the 63-year-old Choe Yong Gon — a former delegate for North-South co-operation — was executed, marking another death of a senior official in a series of high-level purges since Kim Jong Un took charge in late 2011.

The Yonhap report said that Choe had expressed disagreement with Kim’s forestry policies in May and had shown poor work performance.