Remembering VX Terrorism

The Malaysian police realized on Friday that a son of former North Korean leader, Kim Jong-nam, was killed with deadly poison called VX. VX is familiar to the Japanese who can remember the consecutive domestic terrorisms plotted by a cult group, Aum Shinrikyo, in 1990s. The biggest question here is how two assassins did not suffer from direct treatment of such a poisonous material.

The chief of Malaysian National Police, Khalid Abu Bakar, announced that the police detected VX nerve agent from a sample obtained from the face of dead Kim. Two female suspect, one was Indonesian and another was Vietnamese, trapped Kim between the front and back and rubbed certain kind of liquid on his face within a few seconds in Kuala Lumpur International Airport.

The suspects did it with bare hand and escaped the airport with taxi after washing their hands in a restroom. While Kim could walk in a clinic in the airport, he eventually got ill and died in a hospital where he was sent from the airport. There was no injury on the surface of Kim’s corpse.

The suspects have shown no aftereffect of treating the poison. Experts suppose that they might have mixed two less poisonous materials on the face of Kim. Some indicated a possibility that the suspects had taken antidote before the assassination. Four agents with North Korean nationality are supposed to have conducted the assassination.

VX is introduced in Japan as the strongest manmade poison on earth. Aum Shinrikyo used VX gas in the cases assaulting possible spy of police or supporter for deserting the organization in 1994 to 1995. It can be absorbed into human body through mucous membrane of the eyes or nose. The poison can reach every corner of the body through artery in a short time.

Mainichi Shimbun revealed that a convict of death row with crime of terrorism by Aum Shinrikyo in 1995, Satoshi Nakagawa, had referred to a possibility of use of VX in a letter to Professor Anthony Tu in Colorado State University before the announcement of Malaysian police. Nanagawa knew well about VX as a medical expert who committed a murder with VX gas. “Since VX increases secretion, it does not contradict with symptom caused by VX,” told Nakagawa on the report of form around Kim’s mouth. Nakagawa could use VX with long sleeve clothes and glove, because VX would not be vaporized.

It is realized that North Korea possesses certain amount of chemical materials possibly been weaponized. The assassination of Kim Jong-nam ironically demonstrated the ability of the despotic regime to commit chemical terrorism. United States considers listing North Korea as one of the terrorism supporting states again.