Dawn
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14:23 Sep 06, 2025
Elite United States Navy SEALs launched an audacious operation in 2019 to plant a listening device in North Korea to spy on the country’s reclusive leader, Kim Jong Un, The New York Times (NYT) reported on Friday, but the mission quickly unravelled and culminated in the deaths of multiple civilians. The operation came in the first administration of US President Donald Trump during sensitive nuclear talks with Kim, whom the US leader met three times. The mission was considered so risky that it required direct presidential approval, the NYT said, but Trump insisted on Friday he had no knowledge of the operation. “I don’t know anything about it. I’m hearing it now for the first time,” the president told journalists. Despite months of practice, the mission still went horribly wrong, the * NYT* reported. The SEALs — from the same unit that killed Osama bin Laden in 2011 — approached North Korea in mini-submarines that exposed them to frigid water for hours, then swam ashore, according to the newspaper, which inter...