South Korea's spy agency says it has information that North Korea executed its defense chief for sleeping during a meeting and talking back to leader Kim Jong Un.
Lawmaker Shin Kyoung-min says the National Intelligence Service told a closed-door parliamentary committee on Wednesday that People's Armed Forces Minister Hyon Yong Chol was executed in Pyongyang in late April.
The intelligence service told lawmakers that Hyon was killed by an anti-aircraft gun.
NIS didn't tell lawmakers how it got the information and wouldn't comment when contacted by The Associated Press.
ZPU-4 anti-aircraft gun
The lawmakers said Hyon was executed at a firing range at the Kanggon Military Training Area, which is located 14 miles north of the capital Pyongyang.
It is not the first time a ZPU-4 anti-aircraft gun has been used for executions in North Korea, with recently released satellite images showing a number of unidentified people being killed using the brutal method at the same camp last October, Mail Online reports.
Those images showed the targets just 100 feet from the guns, which have a range of 26,000 feet.
The lawmakers said Hyon was executed at a firing range at the Kanggon Military Training Area, which is located 14 miles north of the capital Pyongyang.
Hyon was last known to have spoken publicly at a security conference in Moscow in April, but is said to have shown disrespect to Kim by dozing off at a subsequent military event.
He was also believed to have stood up to and publicly complained about Kim, and had not ignored official orders on multiple occasions, according to the lawmakers.