N. Korea leader fires cabinet vice-premier: state media

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un fired a Cabinet vice-premier during a tour and inauguration of a machinery complex, state news agency KCNA reported on Tuesday.

"Kim Jong Un dismissed Yang Sung Ho, vice-premier of the Cabinet, on the spot," the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) said in report on the inauguration, providing no specifics on the reason for the dismissal, which took place on Monday.

Kim had been inaugurating a modernisation project at the Ryongsong Machine Complex.

In a speech, he criticised "irresponsible, rude and incompetent economic guidance officials", blaming them for delays in the project, KCNA reported.

Kim said the ruling party had "come to a clear-cut determination that the present economic guidance forces can hardly guide the work of readjusting the country's industry as a whole and upgrading it technologically".