When North Korea elects a new legislature tomorrow, outside observers of the secretive nation will be watching for one name: Kim Jong-un, the 26-year-old some believe will be tapped to lead after his father’s death.
Speculation about a successor has been mounting since the 67-year-old leader Kim Jong-il reportedly had a stroke last August.
Recent moves to consolidate his circle of advisers hint he may be setting the stage to hand power to the next generation of the world’s first communist dynasty. If Kim Jong-un joins the legislature tomorrow, it would be a strong sign he is being groomed to take over.
“It would be the first step for Kim Jong-un to inherit power from his father,” said Song Young-sun, a South Korean lawmaker and North Korea expert. “He needs a basis for the North Korean people to revere him before he can move on to higher posts.”
Since members of North Korea’s 687-seat Supreme People’s Assembly typically serve as key party, government and military officials, tomorrow’s election could also give hints of any shake-up in the power structure as the regime faces international pressure to give up its nuclear program and stop developing ballistic missiles.
“It will be interesting to see the results of the ... elections on Sunday,” said analyst Daniel Pinkston of the International Crisis Group, a think tank. “They certainly aren’t free and fair, but we should be able to see some shifts in personnel — who’s in and who’s out in the party.”
Koh Yu-hwan, a North Korea expert at Dongguk University in Seoul, said he expected “new elites” to emerge.
Elections in the country of 24 million people are largely a formality. Polls are held every five years, with only one candidate — hand-picked by the ruling Workers’ Party — running in each constituency.
The election was scheduled for August of last year, around the time of Kim’s reported stroke. North Korea postponed the election, without giving a reason.
Six months later, Kim appears to have recovered. In an open letter to the nation, he announced last month that he would stand again for election, joining soldiers, workers, farmers and intellectuals as candidates, state-run media said on Thursday.
There was no mention of Kim’s son. But South Korea’s Yonhap news agency said Kim Jong-un has been tapped as Kim’s successor and will run tomorrow. Japan’s Mainichi newspaper carried a similar report, citing an internal North Korean military memo.
The South Korean National Intelligence Service said it could not confirm the reports but called a father-to-son succession possible, noting no sign of opposition from top party and military officials.
Recent dispatches in North Korea’s media have emphasized “bloodline” and “inheritance,” possible references to what would be a second hereditary succession. Current leader Kim Jong-il was preceded by his father, Kim Il-sung, the founder of North Korea.
For some time, Kim Jong-il’s late companion Ko Yong-hi, mother to his two younger sons, has been referred to as “Respected Mother” — a phrase seen as a hint North Korea is paving the way for one of her sons to take power.
Little is known about Kim Jong-un, the youngest of three sons Kim Jong-il is known to have fathered.
He studied at the International School of Berne in Switzerland until 1998 under the pseudonym Pak-chol, learning to speak English, German and French, the Swiss weekly news magazine L’Hebdo reported on Thursday, citing classmates and school officials.
A classmate recalled him as timid and introverted but an avid skier and basketball player who was a big fan of American star Michael Jordan. He was humble and friendly with the children of US diplomats, a former school director said. A car arrived every day after school to pick him up, the report said.
A Japanese man who claims to know Jong-un from his years as Kim Jong-il’s sushi chef said the son looked and acted just like his father and was the leader’s favorite. In contrast, Kim often derided the middle son, Jong-chul, as “girlish,” Kenji Fujimoto said in a 2003 memoir.
The eldest son, 37-year-old Jong-nam, had been assumed the heir apparent but fell out of favor after being caught using a fake Dominican passport to get to Tokyo Disneyland in 2001.
Jong-un is believed to have the strongest leadership qualities among the three, said analyst Cheong Seong-chang, rating him as “highly likely” to succeed his father.
Brian Myers, a professor at Dongseo University in Busan, dismissed the speculation as gossip.
“We should not pay too much attention to the succession issue, because it does not make very much difference who takes over,” he said. “The more important thing is the ideology that they all share.”
Even if Jong-un’s name appears when results come out on Monday, it might not be him. In 1998 and 2003, a “Kim Jong-nam” on the candidate list turned out to be another party faithful with the same name as the eldest son.
Archeologists in Peru on Thursday said they found the 5,000-year-old remains of a noblewoman at the sacred city of Caral, revealing the important role played by women in the oldest center of civilization in the Americas. “What has been discovered corresponds to a woman who apparently had elevated status, an elite woman,” archeologist David Palomino said. The mummy was found in Aspero, a sacred site within the city of Caral that was a garbage dump for more than 30 years until becoming an archeological site in the 1990s. Palomino said the carefully preserved remains, dating to 3,000BC, contained skin, part of the
‘WATER WARFARE’: A Pakistani official called India’s suspension of a 65-year-old treaty on the sharing of waters from the Indus River ‘a cowardly, illegal move’ Pakistan yesterday canceled visas for Indian nationals, closed its airspace for all Indian-owned or operated airlines, and suspended all trade with India, including to and from any third country. The retaliatory measures follow India’s decision to suspend visas for Pakistani nationals in the aftermath of a deadly attack by shooters in Kashmir that killed 26 people, mostly tourists. The rare attack on civilians shocked and outraged India and prompted calls for action against their country’s archenemy, Pakistan. New Delhi did not publicly produce evidence connecting the attack to its neighbor, but said it had “cross-border” links to Pakistan. Pakistan denied any connection to
TRUMP EFFECT: The win capped one of the most dramatic turnarounds in Canadian political history after the Conservatives had led the Liberals by more than 20 points Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney yesterday pledged to win US President Donald Trump’s trade war after winning Canada’s election and leading his Liberal Party to another term in power. Following a campaign dominated by Trump’s tariffs and annexation threats, Carney promised to chart “a new path forward” in a world “fundamentally changed” by a US that is newly hostile to free trade. “We are over the shock of the American betrayal, but we should never forget the lessons,” said Carney, who led the central banks of Canada and the UK before entering politics earlier this year. “We will win this trade war and
Armed with 4,000 eggs and a truckload of sugar and cream, French pastry chefs on Wednesday completed a 121.8m-long strawberry cake that they have claimed is the world’s longest ever made. Youssef El Gatou brought together 20 chefs to make the 1.2 tonne masterpiece that took a week to complete and was set out on tables in an ice rink in the Paris suburb town of Argenteuil for residents to inspect. The effort overtook a 100.48m-long strawberry cake made in the Italian town of San Mauro Torinese in 2019. El Gatou’s cake also used 350kg of strawberries, 150kg of sugar and 415kg of
RSS