North Korea Blames US for Internet Outage, Calls Obama a 'Monkey'

North Korea put the blame for its recent Internet woes squarely on the United States and even hurled abuses at President Barack Obama, heightening the heated stand-off between the two nations following the Sony hack episode and the issue of human rights in the communist regime.

North Korea's Internet went off the grid for close to ten hours earlier this week, following days of technical trouble, and while independent hacking groups claimed responsibility for the cyberattack, the Kim Jong-un regime has accused the US for orchestrating it.

"The United States, with its large physical size and oblivious to the shame of playing hide and seek as children with runny noses would, has begun disrupting the Internet operations of the main media outlets of our republic," the North's National Defense Commission said in a statement.

The commission also called Obama a "monkey inhabiting a tropical forest" after accusing him of being behind the controversial film "The Interview" and the Internet outage, according to the Associated Press.

"It is truly laughable," a spokesman for the commission said, as reported by North Korea's official KCNA news agency.

North Korea had earlier lashed out at the US after the latter blamed it for being directly involved in the hacking of Sony Pictures' private information that was leaked online, causing much embarrassment and even a temporary recall of the movie.

Sony, however, released the movie in theaters and on digital platforms on Christmas day after being rebuked by Obama.