OTTO WARMBIER'S MURDER SHOULD NOT CREATE WAR AS KIM JONG UN WANTS

OTTO WARMBIER'S MURDER SHOULD NOT CREATE WAR AS KIM JONG UN WANTS:

COOLER HEADS MUST PREVAIL WITH MORE SANCTIONS AND BAN N. KOREA.

OTTO'S PARENTS DON'T WANT AUTOPSY.

JONG UN USED OTTO TO LURE AMERICA INTO A WORLD WAR THREE TRAP.


Source: CBS News, The Guardian, The Economist, Fox News, YouTube


**** Otto Warmbier's family declines autopsy as Trump calls death a 'total disgrace'

Ohio coroner performs external examination instead of full autopsy on body of the student, who died after being sent home from North Korea in a coma.

An Ohio coroner, abiding by family wishes, has performed an external examination instead of a full autopsy on the body of the US student who was held prisoner in North Korea for 17 months and sent home in a coma.

The Hamilton County coroner’s office was conferring with doctors at a Cincinnati hospital who treated Otto Warmbier, 22, before reaching any conclusions about his death a day earlier, investigator Daryl Zornes said.

Investigators were reviewing radiological images and awaiting additional medical records requested by the coroner, Zornes said.

He declined to estimate how long it would take for the coroner’s office to complete its inquiry. Preliminary autopsy findings had been expected on Tuesday or Wednesday.

There was no immediate word from the family about why relatives declined an autopsy, which may have shed more light on the cause of the neurological injuries that left him in a coma.

Warmbier died days after he was released by the North Korean government and returned to the United States suffering from what US doctors described as extensive brain damage.

Warmbier, an Ohio native and student at the University of Virginia, was arrested in North Korea in January 2016 while visiting as a tourist. He was sentenced two months later to 15 years of hard labor for trying to steal an item bearing a propaganda slogan from his hotel in North Korea’s capital, Pyongyang, the nation’s state media said.

The circumstances of his detention and what medical treatment he received in North Korea remain unknown. Washington has demanded North Korea release three other US citizens it holds in detention: Kim Dong Chul, a missionary, and two academics, Tony Kim and Kim Hak Song.

Warmbier’s death has heightened US-North Korean tensions aggravated by dozens of North Korean missile launches and two nuclear bomb tests since last year in defiance of UN security council resolutions. The North Korean government has vowed to develop a nuclear-tipped intercontinental missile capable of hitting the US mainland.

Warmbier’s family has not specified how he slipped from a comatose state to death, but said in a statement on Monday that the “awful torturous mistreatment” he endured while in captivity meant “no other outcome was possible.“

Relatives have said they were told by US envoys that North Korean officials claimed Warmbier contracted botulism after his trial and lapsed into a coma after taking a sleeping pill. Fred Warmbier, the student’s father, has said he disbelieves this account.

North Korea’s government said it released Warmbier last week on “humanitarian grounds”.

Donald Trump said on Tuesday he had spoken with Warmbier’s family and praised them as “incredible”.

“It’s a total disgrace what happened to Otto,” Trump told reporters in the White House, where he was meeting with the Ukrainian president, Petro Poroshenko. “And frankly, if he were brought home sooner, I think the results would have been a lot different”.

The White House press secretary, Sean Spicer, said the administration would “continue to apply economic and political pressure” on North Korea, in conjunction with US allies and China, “to change this behaviour and this regime”.

Trump said on Twitter on Tuesday he appreciated efforts by the Chinese president, Xi Jinping, to “help with North Korea”, adding: “It has not worked out. At least I know China tried!”

The government of China, North Korea’s main ally, said Warmbier’s death was a tragedy.