Vietnamese woman who unwittingly killed Kim Jong Un’s brother is freed from prison after two years 

A Vietnamese woman who unwittingly killed Kim Jong-un’s brother in a bizarre assassination plot has been freed after two years in a Malaysian prison. 

Doan Thi Huong, 30, was charged along with an Indonesian woman with poisoning Kim Jong Nam by smearing his face with nerve agent liquid VX, a banned chemical weapon, at Kuala Lumpur airport in February 2017.

Malaysian prosecutors dropped a murder charge against Huong last month after she pleaded guilty to an alternate charge of causing harm. 

The 30-year-old was sentenced to 40 months in prison from the day of her arrest and was released early for good behaviour. 

She will return to Vietnam later on Friday, her lawyer, Hisyam Teh, told Reuters.

Doan Thi Huong, 30, was charged along with an Indonesian woman with poisoning Kim Jong Nam by smearing his face with nerve agent liquid VX, a banned chemical weapon, at Kuala Lumpur airport in February 2017 

Huong was taken into immigration custody immediately after her release from a women’s prison, and was believed to have been taken to immigration headquarters in the administrative capital, Putrajaya, where she will remain before boarding a flight to Hanoi.

Vietnamese embassy translator Maridam Yacfar told reporters at the prison that Doan Thi Huong looked ‘happy’ but couldn’t give further details. 

Huong’s co-accused, Siti Aisyah (pictured), smiled as she was leaving Shah Alam High Court in Malaysia in March after prosecutors unexpectedly dropped the murder charge against her

Teh said his client may speak at a brief news conference before boarding her flight on Friday evening. ‘In the event she is unable to talk to media I will read out a statement from her,’ he said.

Huong’s father, Doan Van Thanh, said he and her brother would be in Hanoi to welcome her home.

‘I am so happy now, my whole village is happy now,’ Thanh told Reuters by telephone.

‘We will hold a party on Sunday and anyone can come and join the party. We will slaughter some pigs for the party. My daughter particularly likes fried fish, so we will prepare that too,’ he said. 

Huong was the last suspect in custody after the Malaysian attorney general’s stunning decision in March to drop the murder case against her co-defendant, Indonesian Siti Aisyah, following high-level lobbying from Jakarta. Aisyah returned home to Indonesia. 

South Korean and U.S. officials have said the North Korean regime had ordered the assassination of Kim Jong Nam, who had been critical of his family’s dynastic rule. Pyongyang has denied the allegation.

Kim Jong Nam was the eldest son in the current generation of North Korea’s ruling family. He had been living abroad for years but could have been seen as a threat to Kim Jong Un’s rule. 

The assassination plot: The prosecution failed to show the women had any intention to kill. South Korean and U.S. officials have talked about the involvement of North Korea, ruled by Kim Jong Un (left), in murdering the half-brother of the leader, Kim Jong Nam (right). Pyongyang has denied the allegation

Defence lawyers have maintained the women were pawns in an assassination orchestrated by North Korean agents. The women said they thought they were part of a reality prank show and did not know they were poisoning Kim.

Four North Korean men were also charged but they left Malaysia hours after the murder and remain at large.

Malaysia came under criticism for charging the two women with murder – which carries a mandatory death penalty in the Southeast Asian country – when the key perpetrators were still being sought.