There have been some reports (which you can find here and here) that there may be, well, something fishy happening in Pyongyang:
HARDLINERS have tightened their political grip on North Korea while Kim Jong-il, the Stalinist state’s dictator, has retreated into virtual seclusion after the death of his favourite consort from cancer.
Chinese and Western sources say the regime has prepared for a state of siege as it confronts a re-elected US administration under George W. Bush that is determined to break Pyongyang and disarm it of nuclear weapons.
Reuters followed the story up with a piece of its own that, quite frankly, seems to suggest nothing major is going on:
BEIJING (Reuters) - Portraits of Kim Jong-il have been removed from some public meeting halls in North Korea, a Pyongyang-based diplomat says, but others say the leader’s picture remain prominently displayed.
It was not immediately clear on Tuesday what the removal of some portraits meant about the political fortunes of the North Korean dictator, but the diplomat said the pictures had been down for some time.
Well, it’s been posted.
14 Comments
If you think about Kim Jong Il, his position as top dog in North Korea was never secure. He has no credentials for running North Korea - just being Kim Il Sung’s son doesnt count because dynastic succession is not communist at all. The thing is, there are other people in the North Korean leadership who have more communist credentials, including those veteran soldiers who actually fought the Japanese and Americans. Those are the guys who SHOULD be in charge. Kim’s only claim to legitimacy may be his shrewdness at diplomacy and possibly a promise to extract concessions (ie money to rebuild the norks economy) from the outside world, particularly the USA.
If I were to speculate further, I’d say that Kim’s failure to deliver on his “promise” would be sufficient grounds to push him aside as the North Korean head honcho. The US election may just have proven to the desperate Nork leadership that Kim’s promise is not going to come through.
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[...] h to bolster a suspicion that Ive had over the last couple of days, namely, all the por [...]
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Is something odd going in up North?
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