North Korea condemned on Thursday the latest US sanctions imposed on people and organizations accused of cybercrimes, saying they showed Washington’s “wicked nature to be hostile” against the regime.

The criticism came after the US Treasury announced this week sanctions on eight individuals and two entities “for their role in laundering funds derived from a variety of illicit Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) schemes”.

The individuals were “state-sponsored hackers”, the department said, whose illicit operations were conducted “to fund the regime’s nuclear weapons program” by stealing and laundering money. (AFP)