Accusing the U.S. of shutting down the country’s Internet and angry over the release of the movie The Interview, North Korea has compared President Obama to a monkey, the Associated Press reports.
The North’s National Defense Commission, which is headed by Kim Jong Un, the country’s leader, and is the country’s top governing body, blamed Obama for the release of the Sony Pictures Entertainment’s film, the report says. The comedy film depicts the assassination of Kim.
“Obama always goes reckless in words and deeds like a monkey in a tropical forest,” an unidentified spokesman at the commission’s Policy Department said in a statement carried by the official Korean Central News Agency, according to AP. The statement described the movie as illegal, dishonest and reactionary.
North Korea has denied involvement in a major cyberattack on Sony. A hacking group calling itself Guardians of Peace said it carried out the cyberattack and called for the movie to be shelved. Sony Pictures initially called off the release of the film, citing threats of terrorist attacks against U.S. movie theaters. But the movie opened this past week after Obama and others criticized Sony’s decision.
North Korea also blamed the Obama administration for a major disruption of Internet service in the North this week, which occurred after the U.S. pledged to respond to the Sony hack. The U.S. government has declined to say whether it was behind the shutdown.
Read more at the Associated Press.