Spy? Sneaky North Korea runaway ARRESTED in Seoul preparing to DEFECT back to Kim Jong-un

The 49-year-old woman is accused of sending 130 tons of rice worth about 105 million won (£69,147) to North Korea’s State Security Ministry.

Prosecutors claim the rice was sent via a broker in China on two occasions last year.

The former secretive state citizen is believed to have been planning an audacious return to North Korea after selling her house and possessions.

It follows threats by North Korea that the US and Donald Trump will be destroyed by a “nuclear holocaust” after the US President made an “open declaration of war”.

The United States is “doomed to ruin” according to Kim Jong-un’s propaganda mouthpiece.

In an opinion piece published in Rodong Sinmun this week, North Korea blasted Donald Trump’s “empire of evil” and threatened conflict if America did not back off and leave North Korea to accelerate its own missile programme. 

The propaganda rag also dismissed the validity of America’s Nuclear Posture Review (NPR), claiming Mr Trump was using the report as an excuse to launch a deadly attack on North Korea. 

The newspaper, which essentially acts as a mouthpiece for Kim’s government, said: “The NPR is nothing but an open declaration of war by the rogue state which means to dare make a preemptive nuclear strike on the DPRK in order to bring the Korean peninsula and the world into a nuclear holocaust.

“The NPR invented by the Trump group is a product of the black-hearted intention to realise the ambition for aggression by starting a nuclear war on the Korean Peninsula at any cost.

“The Trump group’s racket for confrontation with the DPRK is a suicidal act of digging a pitfall of ruin by itself.

“Once the DPRK starts its decisive military strike, the mainland of the US, as well as its military bases in the Pacific area of operations will never be safe.”

Hopes for a calmer future had been buoyed by South Korean supporters embracing North Korean athletes during the Winter Olympics. 

North Korea’s Han Chun Gyong and Pak Il Chol trundled home 100 places behind the leaders in the men’s 15km cross-country and the stands were nearly empty apart from a group of South Korean supporters.

Han said: “I gained strength from the support of our countrymen.

”I think it will be even more meaningful once we achieve reunification.

“I will train harder and sweat to achieve higher scores at future Games.”

North Korea has sent 22 athletes to Pyeongchang as part of a charm offensive after months of bellicose rhetoric and provocative missile launches.