North Korea has rejected a recent report by the Multilateral Sanctions Monitoring Team (MSMT) on the country’s illicit overseas worker schemes, branding the multinational body a U.S.-backed “ghost group” and characterizing its efforts to scrutinize Pyongyang’s economic ties as unlawful interference.

In a statement released by the state-run Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) on Monday, an unidentified spokesperson for North Korea’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs castigated the 11-nation monitoring mechanism as a “plot-breeding organization which distorts normal as abnormal and brands legal as illegal”.

The statement came almost a week after the MSMT released its third reporton DPRK