Geneva: North Korean security chiefs and possibly even Supreme Leader Kim Jong-un should face international justice for ordering systematic torture, starvation and killings comparable to Nazi-era atrocities, UN investigators said..

The investigators told Mr Kim in a letter they were advising the United Nations to refer North Korea to the International Criminal Court, to make sure any culprits "including possibly yourself" were held accountable.

The unprecedented public rebuke and warning to a head of state by a UN inquiry is likely to further antagonise Mr Kim and complicate efforts to persuade him to rein in his isolated country's nuclear weapons program and belligerent confrontations with South Korea and the West.

North Korea "categorically and totally" rejected the accusations set out in a 372-page report, saying they were based on material faked by hostile forces backed by the United States, the European Union and Japan.