BATTLE FOR WORLD / WASHINGTONPOST | March 16, 2019: The article highlights that days before President Trump met North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in Vietnam, a mysterious incident in Spain threatened to derail the entire high-stakes nuclear summit.

In broad daylight, masked assailants were reported to have infiltrated North Korea’s embassy in Madrid, tied up the staff, stole computers and mobile phones, and then fled the scene in two luxury vehicles.

The group behind the late February (2019) operation, according to sources - people familiar with the planning and execution of the mission: is known as Cheollima Civil Defense, a secretive dissident organization committed to overthrowing the Kim dynasty, according to the Washington Post.

The group’s alleged role in the attack was not reported in media at the time, and officials from the government of North Korea, the United States and Spain declined to comment on the situation.

But in recent days, rumors about what motivated the attack have swirled in Spanish media, including a report in El Pais alleging that two of the masked assailants have ties to the CIA.

Silence about U.S. involvement in the assault on a diplomatic compound could have derailed the talks, the likelihood of which the CIA would probably be aware. “Infiltrating a North Korean embassy days before the nuclear summit would throw that all into jeopardy,” said Sue Mi Terry, a former Korea analyst at the CIA. And that: “This is not something the CIA would undertake.”

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