Image copyright Getty Images Image caption It is confirmed that Mr Thae (seen on the right in this file picture) is in South Korea 
 
 A top North Korean diplomat who disappeared from the country's embassy in London has defected to South Korea, officials in Seoul have confirmed. 
 
 Thae Yong-ho and his family are under the government's protection, a South Korean official said. 
 
 Mr Thae was the ambassador's deputy and is thought to be the highest-ranking North Korean official ever to defect. 
 
 His main mission in London had been to spread positive perceptions of the North Korean leadership. 
 
 He had been due to return to Pyongyang with his wife and children. 
 
 Mr Thae had come under pressure from his government to quash growing criticism of North Korea's human rights record, sources say. 
 
 The BBC's diplomatic correspondent, James Robbins, says it now looks as if Mr Thae's heart may not have been in the task of defending North Korea. 
 
 In the past, Mr Thae had argued the British were brainwashed by their ruling class into believing "shocking, terrifying" lies about North Korea under its leader Kim Jong-un. 
 
 "If the people in this country, or in America, knew that there is a country in the world where there is a free education, free housing, free medical care, then they'd have second thoughts," he had said in one speech. 
 
 South Korea spokesman Jeong Joon-hee said: "On his reasons for defection, Minister Thae cited disgust with Kim Jong-Un's regime, admiration for South Korea's free, democratic system and the future of his family." ||||| SEOUL, South Korea — A senior North Korean defector has told NBC News that the country's "desperate" dictator is prepared to use nuclear weapons to strike the United States and its allies. 
 
 Thae Yong Ho is the most high profile North Korean defector in two decades, meaning he is able to give a rare insight into the secretive, authoritarian regime. 
 
 According to Thae, North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un is "desperate in maintaining his rule by relying on his [development of] nuclear weapons and ICBM." He was using an acronym for intercontinental ballistic missiles — a long range rocket that in theory would be capable of hitting the U.S. 
 
 NBC Nightly News Exclusive: Lester Holt anchors from South Korea on Monday and Tuesday, April 3 and 4, at 6:30pm ET. 
 
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 "Once he sees that there is any kind of sign of a tank or an imminent threat from America, then he would use his nuclear weapons with ICBM," he added in an exclusive interview on Sunday. 
 
 Thae was living in London and serving as North Korea's deputy ambassador to the United Kingdom when he and his family defected to South Korea and were announced to the world in August. 
 
 He was not directly involved in North Korea's weapons program but believes his country "has reached a very significant level of nuclear development." 
 
 North Korea is estimated to have upward of eight nuclear weapons but has not demonstrated the ability to attach them to a long-range rocket, an ICBM, capable of hitting the U.S. 
 
 “ Kim Jong Un is a man who can do anything beyond the normal imagination” 
 
 Analysts are unsure exactly how close the regime is to achieving this aim, but a senior official told NBC News in January that his government was ready to test-fire an ICMB "at any time, at any place." 
 
 Adm. Scott Swift, commander of the U.S. Pacific Fleet, told NBC News that American officials were particularly troubled by this latest threat. 
 
 "They have the nuclear capability — they've demonstrated that," he said. "And then, where they're going with the miniaturization of that, whether they can actually weaponize a missile, that's what's driving the current concern." 
 
 PHOTOS: The Tangled History of North Korea’s Kim Jong Un 
 
 Thae's interview with NBC News comes against a backdrop of rising tensions surrounding North Korea, which has significantly increased its missile and nuclear tests under Kim's rule. 
 
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 President Donald Trump told the Financial Times newspaper on Monday that "something had to be done" about North Korea. This came after Defense Secretary James Mattis said the country "has got to be stopped" and Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said military action was "on the table." 
 
 "It does feel more dangerous — I'll give you three reasons," according to Adm. James Stavridis, an NBC News analyst and dean of the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University in Massachusetts. "One is [Kim's] own precarious situation in command of the nation. Number two is the instability in South Korea. We've just seen the South Korean president indicted, arrested, and incarcerated." 
 
 "And, number three, a new and more aggressive American foreign policy coming from Washington," he added. 
 
 Lester Holt walks with North Korean defector Thae Yong Ho in Seoul. NBC News 
 
 Some analysts have warned that military action against the country might be very difficult and even disastrous. An invasion could risk a retaliatory strike against U.S. allies of Japan and South Korea, whose capital, Seoul, is just 50 miles from the border. 
 
 Nonetheless, Thae warned America and its allies to be prepared. 
 
 "If Kim Jong Un has nuclear weapons and ICBMs, he can do anything," he said. "So, I think the world should be ready to deal with this kind of person." 
 
 He added that "Kim Jong Un is a man who can do anything beyond the normal imagination" and that "the final and the real solution to the North Korean nuclear issue is to eliminate Kim Jong Un from the post." 
 
 Kim came to power in 2012 and has defined his strongman premiership by the pursuit of a nuclear weapon that can hit the U.S. He has conducted more missile tests than in the rest of the country's history combined, and three of North Korea's five nuclear tests came under his watch. 
 
 According to Thae, Kim is obsessed with obtaining nukes because he saw what happened to Iraq's Saddam Hussein and Libya's Moammar Gadhafi, both of whom abandoned their countries' weapons of mass destruction programs and then were overthrown by Western-backed forces. 
 
 “ Our freedom here is achieved at the cost of the sacrifice of my family members left in North Korea” 
 
 Many analysts agree that Kim sees a nuclear weapon — and the retaliatory threat it poses — as an insurance policy against a similar strategy being pursued against him. 
 
 "That's why Kim Jong Un strongly believes that only a nuclear weapon can guarantee his rule," Thae said. 
 
 According to the former diplomat, the world should look to Kim's past actions to see what he is capable of. The young leader has reportedly been responsible for purges and executions of top officials and even members of his own family. 
 
 Last month, according to U.S. and South Korean intelligence officials, he masterminded the assassination of his own half-brother, Kim Jong Nam, at an airport in Malaysia. 
 
 "Kim Jong Un is a person who did not even hesitate to kill his uncle and a few weeks ago, even his half-brother," Thae said. "So, he is a man who can do anything to remove [anyone in] his way." 
 
 North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un attends a competition between tank units from the Korean People's Army this year. KCNA via AFP/Getty Images 
 
 Since his defection Thae has been making media appearances and giving talks denouncing North Korea's controlling and often brutal society. For this reason he believes he could be the next victim. 
 
 "I am already a marked man," he said. "Kim Jong Un wants to eliminate any person or any country which poses a threat to him. And I think I am really a great threat to him." 
 
 Thae was the highest-ranking North Korean official to abandon the regime and enter public life in South Korea since the 1997 defection of Hwang Jang Yop, who was responsible for crafting "Juche" — North Korea's state ideology, which blends elements of Marxism with ultra-nationalism. 
 
 He made the decision to switch sides, he said, after his two sons began asking questions about why North Korea did not allow the internet, why there was no proper legal system and why officials were executed without trial. 
 
 His sons also complained they were being mocked by their British friends. 
 
 "All of my family members were a little bit frightened, you know, on that day," he said of the moment he decided to escape. "But I always told them that we have to try to be as peaceful as possible. We should carry the normal faces and normal feelings so that our plan of defection should not be noticed by anyone in the embassy." 
 
 This came at a high price, however. He was able to escape with his wife and children — but he fears his brother and sister in North Korea have been punished for his actions. 
 
 "Our freedom here is achieved at the cost of the sacrifice of my family members left in North Korea," he said. "When a defection of my level happens, the North Korean regime usually sends the family members of high officials, defectors, to remote areas or labor camps and, to some extent, even to political prison camps as well." 
 
 This fate is not unique. More than 100,000 people are believed to have been detained in North Korea's notorious gulags, where they are subjected to forced labor, torture and executions — treatment the United Nations said was "strikingly similar" to the atrocities of Nazi Germany. 
 
 Families are taken away by the country's secret police for arbitrary crimes such as "gossiping" about the state. 
 
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 This is all part of the dictatorship's attempt to restrict information reaching North Korean families from the outside world. Most people cannot use the internet or access foreign media — Kim's attempt to maintain the pretense that his country is prosperous and the Western world is failing. 
 
 In all, North Korea "remains one of the most repressive states in the world," according to Human Rights Watch. 
 
 But according to Thae, the mask is slipping. More and more, North Koreans are able to watch South Korean films, giving them a true picture of their far more prosperous neighbor. 
 
 "I'm absolutely sure that once North Korean people are educated enough, then they may stand up," according to the former ambassador. "North Korean population now knows well that South Korea is democratic, the society and economy here are very well." 
 
 This, Thae said, "has already made the North Korean population not believe what the regime has been teaching and has been brainwashing them." 
 
 He added: "I think this is really a great change in people's mind, because they do not believe in the government's propaganda system." 
 
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 In this shift may even lie the seeds of fundamental change in North Korea, according to Thae. 
 
 "I think that is very important. And once the people do not believe in what the leadership is saying, then there is a great possibility for possible uprising: what happened in Soviet Union, what happened in communist system in Eastern Europe," he said. 
 
 "Because when the people in those Eastern European countries knew that the Western Europe were much better than Eastern Europe — the democratic society was much better than communist society and one-party system — all of a sudden people stood up against the system," he added. "These things could also happen in North Korea." 
 
 Thae said that he and other defectors can play a crucial part removing Kim. 
 
 "Every day I am living in order to accelerate the speed of my return home," he said. "I think defectors like me, we should all unite together to bring down Kim Jong Un's regime." ||||| North Korean leader Kim Jong-un executed two top officials publicly, killing them with an anti-aircraft gun, a source with special knowledge of North Korea told the JoongAng Ilbo.One was apparently killed for nodding off during a meeting with Kim.The executed men were Hwang Min, former agricultural minister, and Ri Yong-jin, who had a senior position in the education ministry, possibly as high as minister level.“I have the information that ministers of agriculture and education were publicly executed on a special order from Kim Jong-un,” said the source. The executions took place at a military academy in Pyongyang, he said, and an anti-aircraft gun was used.If the report is true, it would mark the first execution ordered by Kim Jong-un from outside the Workers’ Party and military.The report may be interpreted as a new reign of terror in North Korea prompted by a series of defections by senior officials that has rekindled talk of instability and disunity among the North Korean elite.“One of the executed is Hwang Min, a former agricultural minister,” said the source. “I understand he was executed because policy proposals he had pushed for were seen as a direct challenge to the Kim Jong-un leadership."The source did not elaborate what the proposal was or why it was seen as a challenge to the leader. Hwang was replaced by Ko In-ho at a meeting of the rubber-stamp parliament in late June before apparently being executed.The other ill-fated official was Ri Yong-jin, who the source said was a ministerial-level official at the education ministry.“He incurred the wrath of Kim after he dozed off during a meeting presided over by Kim. He was arrested on site and intensively questioned by the state security ministry. He was executed after other charges such as corruption were found during the probe.”In North Korea, there are two ministries related to education: the Ministry of Common Education and Ministry of Higher Education, which are headed by Kim Sung-du and Thae Hyong-chol, who is also president of Kim Il Sung University. A government official said the ill-fated Ri could have had a minister-level position at one of the two.Since taking over after his father’s death in late 2011, Kim has carried out a series of executions of party and military officials. The most high-profile was the December 2013 execution of Jang Song-thaek, Kim’s uncle and former political guardian. Another high-profile execution was that of Hyon Yong-chol, North Korea’s former defense chief, who South Korean intelligence said was executed by firing squad in April 2015 on charges of dozing off during a meeting attended by the supreme leader.If the report of the two executions is true, they may have been related to a series of defections by senior North Korean officials with privileged backgrounds.The recent defection of Thae Yong-ho, formerly No. 2 at the North Korean embassy in London, sparked speculation that there is disunity among the North’s inner circle and a decline in faith in the Kim regime. The young leader could have felt the need to impose a sense of terror among elite officials to reinforce their loyalty.“The recent series of defections by top officials is less a looming sign of the collapse of the North Korean regime than the outcome of the North’s wrong policies for its overseas officials,” said Kim Byung-yeon, professor of economics at Seoul National University, who specializes in the North Korean economy.North Korean officials overseas are said to be under growing pressure to find source of hard currency to be transferred to Pyongyang after sanctions were slapped on the country in March, following its fourth nuclear test in January and a long-range missile launch the following month. Such pressure could have driven elite officials like Thae to opt to defect to the South rather than face dire consequences back home after failing to find the motherland extra sources of foreign exchange, observers say.President Park Geun-hye said Monday that her government would continue to “send a message of hope for North Korean people for the life of liberty and dignity.”At a meeting with senior secretaries at the Blue House, Park said, “Improving human rights conditions in North Korea is a humanitarian issue that cannot be put off any more and a cornerstone to bringing about an era of peace on the Korean Peninsula.”She called on the military to maintain readiness so the North Korean regime can be brought to “self-destruction” should it choose to provoke the South violently.BY KANG JIN-KYU, LEE YOUNG-JONG [kang.jinkyu@joongang.co.kr]
– A North Korean diplomat stationed in London vanished in mid-July, and Seoul is now explaining why: Thae Yong Ho has defected to South Korea, in what the BBC reports could be the "highest-ranking" defection North Korea has experienced. The New York Times calls Thae the "No. 2" official of the five stationed at North Korea's London embassy, and the Guardian reports it is the first such defection to have occurred since the embassy opened its doors 13 years ago. Thae and his family "are currently under government protection and relevant institutions are going ahead with necessary procedures as usual," said a South Korean unification ministry rep. The Guardian calls the defection a "coup" for global intelligence agencies, who may be able to gain insight into Kim Jong Un's regime. In London, Pyongyang had charged Thae with keeping tabs on defectors living there, and was also supposed to combat negative perceptions of the North.