SEOUL >> A South Korean court has sentenced a North Korean agent to 10 years in prison for plotting to assassinate a high-profile defector.

Seoul Central District Court spokesman Kim Sang-woo says that Ri Dong Sam admitted that he was ordered to kill Hwang Jang-yop, a former senior member of the North’s ruling Workers’ Party who died of heart failure last year.

Ri came to South Korea in August by posing as a defector and his identity was discovered while being interrogated.

Friday’s ruling came three months after Hwang died from heart failure at his Seoul home.

Hwang was chief architect of North Korea’s guiding “juche” philosophy of self-reliance. He was one of the country’s most powerful officials when he fled in 1997.