Secretive North Korea yesterday published its first-ever adult photograph of a man said to be the youngest son and heir apparent to the communist state’s ailing leader, Kim Jong-il.
A group photo released by the official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) shows leading ruling party officials at a photo session in Pyongyang following a rare party conference which bestowed powerful posts on the son, Kim Jong-un.
The caption only names Kim Jong-il. However, experts said a chubby-faced young man sitting next but one to the leader is Kim Jong-un, the leader’s third son.
Photo: AFP PHOTO / KCNA via KNS
The young man who seems on course to take over the impoverished, but nuclear-armed, nation is a mystery to the outside world and no adult photo had previously been issued.
The son’s name was not mentioned by official media until this week, when Kim Jong-il appointed him a four-star general and he was given two powerful posts in the ruling party when it held its largest meeting in 30 years.
The US and other nations are scrambling for more information about the Swiss-educated Kim Jong-un, believed aged about 27.
“The man who is sitting second next to Kim Jong-il on his right side is Kim Jong-un,” Kim Yong-hyun of Dongguk University said after the picture was issued.
Yang Moo-jin of the University of North Korean Studies said Kim Jong-un takes after his grandfather Kim Il-sung, but is short and stout like his father.
“The publication of his picture is tantamount to a declaration that Jong-un is the heir apparent,” Yang said. “This is also a signal that the junior Kim is launching official activities.”
South Korean officials could not officially confirm the identification, but an intelligence official said on condition of anonymity that the man is Kim Jong-un.
The US Central Intelligence Agency’s Leon Panetta will arrive in South Korea tomorrow to exchange information about the succession process, Yonhap reported.
Analysts say the North will likely seek to ease overseas tensions as it prepares for an eventual power transfer from the ailing 68-year-old leader to his son.
However, the first inter-Korean military talks in two years ended without progress yesterday as Seoul demanded an apology from Pyongyang for the deadly sinking of a warship, the South’s defense ministry said.
The talks were seen as an opportunity to ease months of tensions, but broke down after about two hours over the fate of the Cheonan corvette.
South Korean officers “strongly urged North Korea to admit to, apologize for and punish those responsible for the attack on the Cheonan warship,” the ministry said in a statement.
It also demanded the North “immediately stop its military threats and aggressive behavior at sea borders.”
The North refused to accept the findings of a multinational investigation which blamed the March sinking and the death of 46 sailors on a North Korean torpedo.
The two sides failed to set a date for the next round of talks, a ministry official told Yonhap. After months of high tension over the ship, the North has lately made apparent conciliatory gestures to South Korea and the US.
However, it still vehemently denies involvement in the naval tragedy and describes joint US-South Korean naval exercises being staged as a show of strength as a rehearsal for attack.
South Korean officials “remain unchanged in their ulterior intention to harm the [North], backed by their American master,” Cabinet newspaper Minju Joson said yesterday, accusing Seoul of trying to spark a nuclear war with the latest joint drill this week.
South Korean Defense -Minister Kim Tae-young told a forum Seoul has detected signs of possible provocations by North Korea, especially in 11 border areas where the South has set up propaganda loudspeakers as part of its reprisals for the warship sinking.
The loudspeakers have not yet been switched on.
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