KCNA/Reuters
North Korea said U.S. officials “assaulted” its delegation at New York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport when they forcibly seized a package the group was carrying on its return from a United Nations conference, the official Korean Central News Agency said Sunday. The nearly 20 American officers “made a violent assault like gangsters to take away the diplomatic package from the DPRK diplomats who were in possession of a valid diplomatic courier certificate,” KCNA said, using the initials for North Korea’s formal name. It is not yet clear what was in the package. “The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the DPRK regards this mugging by the U.S. as an intolerable act of infringement upon the sovereignty of the DPRK and a malicious provocation, and strongly condemns it,” the KCNA said.