Where is Kim? Jong-un misses North Korea’s big celebration

Kim Jong-un failed to appear at one of the most important celebrations of the year, provoking speculation that he was ill.

Kim Jong-un in a picture released on April 11. Picture: AFP.

Kim Jong-un failed to appear at one of the most important national celebrations of the year in North Korea, provoking speculation that he was ill.

The country’s supreme leader last featured in state-run media on Saturday, presiding over a meeting of the politburo. He was not, however, reported as having overseen the test firing of cruise missiles on Tuesday.

He was then absent from ceremonies on Wednesday to mark the 108th anniversary of the birth of Kim Il-sung, his late grandfather and North Korea’s founding president.

The “Day of the Sun” is one of the central days in the cult of the Kim family. Mr Kim, who is believed to be 36, has encouraged comparisons between himself and his grandfather, the 100th anniversary of whose birth in 2012 was marked by intense celebrations.

However, reports yesterday (Thursday) covering a visit by senior officials to Kim Il-sung’s mausoleum, the Kumsusan Palace of the Sun, did not mention his grandson, as they have in previous years. Although flowers bearing his name were presented by soldiers, he appears not to have sent a bouquet to be laid at the giant statues of his grandfather and his father, Kim Jong-il, in the centre of Pyongyang.

This undated picture released from North Korea's Korean Central News Agency on April 12, 2020 shows Kim Jong-un inspecting a pursuit assault plane group. Picture: KCNA via AFP.

Mr Kim has disappeared from view before, only to reappear again. In 2014, there was speculation that he had died, been toppled in a coup, or was paralysed by obesity caused by a surfeit of Swiss cheese. He re-emerged after almost six weeks, beaming broadly and supported by a walking stick after apparently suffering from gout.

There are suggestions that this time he is avoiding the coronavirus or that he has contracted it. North Korea claims to be one of the few countries in the world not to have had a single case, a claim regarded as unlikely by foreign observers, given the country’s long border with China.

Another suggestion is that Mr Kim may be attempting to remove the emphasis on the heroism of his forebears to focus it more directly on himself.

“I think it’s a big deal … but it’s unclear what it means,” Peter Ward, a British researcher on North Korea based in Seoul, said. “The lack of flowers is truly bizarre. There was a fair number of … photos taken and the absence is rather conspicuous. Perhaps it’s a deliberate signal meant to de-emphasise the Kim Il-sung cult … I think he might be sick, but who knows?”

The US government has also issued a report warning of the dangers of North Korean cybercrime, including theft, hacking, money laundering and extortion, which it refers to by the code name “hidden cobra”.

“The Democratic People’s Republic of Korea’s malicious cyberactivities threaten the United States and the broader international community and, in particular, pose a significant threat to the integrity and stability of the international financial system,” the report, jointly issued by the US State Department, the Department of Homeland Security, the Treasury and the FBI, said.

“Under the pressure of robust US and UN sanctions, the DPRK has increasingly relied on illicit activities – including cybercrime – to generate revenue for its weapons of mass destruction and ballistic missile programs.”

The most notorious North Korean cyberscam was an attempt to steal dollars 1 billion from the Bangladesh central bank in 2016. In the end, most of the transfers were blocked or recovered, although the thieves, believed to be North Korean, got away with dollars 63 million channelled via bank accounts in the Philippines.

A shadowy group known by the name Lazarus carried out the so-called Wannacry ransomware attack in 2017, which affected more than 300,000 computers in 150 countries, including those of the National Health Service.

The Times