WPK events used to glorify Kim Jong-un

Posted on : 2010-10-11 14:29 KST Modified on : 2010-10-11 14:29 KST
Experts believe N.Korea is moving to put Kim in the domestic and international spotlight prior to succession
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By Lee Je-hoon, Staff writer

  

North Korea has been using events connected to 65th anniversary of the founding of the Workers’ Party of Korea (WPK) as an opportunity to dramatically highlight the presence of Kim Jong-un, the WPK’s Central Military Committee vice chairman, within and outside the country.

Kim has appeared along his father, North Korean leader Kim Jong-il, at a 65th anniversary military review held Sunday at the Kim Il-sung Square, a service paying respects to Kim Il-sung at Kumsusan Memorial Palace at midnight on Saturday, a 65th anniversary central report meeting held Saturday afternoon at the May First Stadium and a 65th anniversary performing of the “mass calisthenics and arts show ‘Arirang,’ also held Saturday afternoon at the May First Stadium.”

Additionally, the country invited journalists from major world media outlets, including the CNN and BBC, and permitted them to cover the scene at the 65th anniversary events in order to inform the outside world about the “successor Kim Jong-un.”

For the first time in history, North Korea’s state-run television and radio networks gave a 1 hour and 48-minute simultaneous live broadcast of the large-scale military review, held Sunday morning at Kim Il-sung Square in Pyongyang.

“As far as we are aware, there has been no previous instance of North Korean media giving a live broadcast of an event with Chairman Kim Jong-il in attendance,” said a Unification Ministry official.

Alina Cho, who provided live commentary from the scene of the review for CNN, said that it was a well-produced stage for the designated new leader, Kim Jong-un.

Kim Jong-un appeared at the leaders’ platform for the military review on Sunday. He stood about one meter to the right of Kim Jong-il for around ten minutes, but after Chief of General Staff Ri Yong-ho arrived at the square in a large car and gave the “review salute” to Kim Jong-il, he moved to a space on the platform between Kim Jong-il and Kim Jong-un.

On Saturday, Yang Hyong-sop, the Supreme People’s Assembly standing committee vice chairman, who appeared as one of the people giving reports for the 65th anniversary central report meeting held on Saturday.

Yang said, “We must continue through the generations illuminating the leadership achievements of the Great Leader (Kim Il-sung) and Dear Leader (Kim Jong-il) in building an immortal party.” In a solo interview Friday with APTN in Pyongyang, Yang said, “We have now gained the honor of serving the young General Comrade Kim Jong-un.”

Materials glorifying Kim Jong-un have also begun making an appearance in earnest. At a lecture meeting on the topic “The Heaven and Hell of North Korea” held Sunday at Tokyo’s Meiji University, Open Radio for North Korea President Ha Tae-kyung said that around late September or early October, his group obtained “educational materials that appear to be geared toward central WPK officials and party members.”

In the materials, of which only the content was disclosed in order to protect the person providing the information, Kim Jong-un is called a “model of devotion who has reproduced devotion for the Dear General from the highest height.” The materials also say that Kim “has perfectly mastered revolutionary thinking based on an extraordinary investigative mind, wise insight, and profound analytical judgment and is enriching and developing it.”

The materials go on to say that Kim led a counterfire operation when calls for an interception emerged in the United States in response to the launch of the Kwangmyongsong-2 on April 5, 2009, and tell a story about how he first picked up a gun at the age of three and was already a crack shot.

 

Please direct questions or comments to [englishhani@hani.co.kr]

 

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