North Korea said on Friday that it has executed Kim Jong-un's uncle, calling the leader's former mentor a traitor who tried to seize power and overthrow the state.

The stunning announcement came only days after Jang Song-thaek -- long considered the country's No. 2 power -- was removed from all his posts because of a long list of allegations, including corruption, drug use, gambling and womanizing. 

In an unusually detailed announcement, the official news agency KCNA said Jang had been tried for "such hideous crime as attempting to overthrow the state by all sorts of intrigues and despicable methods with a wild ambition to grab the supreme power of our party and state".

It called him a "traitor to the nation for all ages" and "worse than a dog".