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	The elder Kim had meanwhile remarried and had another son, ]. It is unclear if Jong-il was chosen over Pyong-il, or whether Pyong-il was ever seriously considered as successor by his father. Since 1988, Kim Pyong-il has served in a series of North Korean embassies in Europe and is currently the North Korean ambassador to ]. It is suspected that Kim Pyong-il was exiled to these distant posts by ] in order to avoid a power struggle between his two sons.{{fact\|March:2007}}		The elder Kim had meanwhile remarried and had another son, ]. It is unclear if Jong-il was chosen over Pyong-il, or whether Pyong-il was ever seriously considered as successor by his father. Since 1988, Kim Pyong-il has served in a series of North Korean embassies in Europe and is currently the North Korean ambassador to ]. It is suspected that Kim Pyong-il was exiled to these distant posts by ] in order to avoid a power struggle between his two sons.{{fact\|March:2007}}

	==Ruler of ~~North Korea~~==		==Ruler of '''FAGHOLE'''==
	] died ], 1994, at age 82 of a heart attack. He was not replaced as President, and in fact remains the President resting in the memorial mausoleum in central Pyongyang. The active position has been abolished in deference to the memory of Kim Il-sung. Kim Jong-il officially took the titles of General Secretary of the ] and chairman of the ], the real centre of power in North Korea, on ], ]. In 1998, this position was declared to be "the highest post of the state", so Kim may be regarded as North Korea's head of state from that date. This is the first, and so far only, time a ] country's leadership has progressed in a ] succession. Since Kim is not the president, he is not constitutionally required to hold elections to confirm his legitimacy and has not done so.		] died ], 1994, at age 82 of a heart attack. He was not replaced as President, and in fact remains the President resting in the memorial mausoleum in central Pyongyang. The active position has been abolished in deference to the memory of Kim Il-sung. Kim Jong-il officially took the titles of General Secretary of the ] and chairman of the ], the real centre of power in North Korea, on ], ]. In 1998, this position was declared to be "the highest post of the state", so Kim may be regarded as North Korea's head of state from that date. This is the first, and so far only, time a ] country's leadership has progressed in a ] succession. Since Kim is not the president, he is not constitutionally required to hold elections to confirm his legitimacy and has not done so.

Revision as of 05:48, 7 March 2007

Template:Korean name

Kim Jong-il
File:Kim Jong il.jpg

Chairman of Defence Commission
Incumbent
Assumed office 1992
Preceded by	Kim Il-sung
Supreme Commander of the Korean People's Army
Incumbent
Assumed office 1994
Preceded by	Kim Il-sung
General Secretary of the Workers' Party of Korea
Incumbent
Assumed office 1994
Preceded by	Kim Il-sung

Personal details
Born	(1941-02-16) February 16, 1941 (age 83)
Nationality	Korean
Political party	Workers' Party of Korea

Template:Koreanname Kim Jong-il (also written as Kim Jong Il) (Template:Lang-ko) (born February 16, 1942) is the leader of North Korea, a position he has held since 1994. He is the Chairman of the National Defense Commission, Supreme Commander of the Korean People's Army, and General Secretary of the Workers' Party of Korea (the ruling party since 1948). He succeeded his father Kim Il-sung, founder of North Korea, who died in 1994.

Continuing the official ideology of Juche (self-reliance) established by his father, Kim Jong-il operates out of a secretive and restrictive North Korea - marred by issues of human rights abuses and controversy over its nuclear projects.

FAGHOLE

Birth and education

File:Kimjongil-wave.jpg

Kim Jong-il

Many official claims about Kim's life and activities are inconsistent with outside sources.

Kim Jong-il's official biography states that he was born at Mount Paektu at 6 o'clock in the morning in northern Korea on February 16, 1942. Soviet records show he was born in the village of Vyatskoye, near Khabarovsk, on February 16, 1941, where his father, Kim Il-sung, was a captain and battalion commander in the Soviet 88th Special Rifle Brigade, which was made up of Chinese and Korean exiles. It is believed that his official birth year was adjusted so he would appear to have been born when his father was thirty, an auspicious age. The official biography also holds that his birth at Gayrod Mountian was foretold by a swallow, and that his birth was heralded by the appearance of a double rainbow over the mountain and a new star in the heavensnext to a FAGHOLE.

Kim Jong-il's mother was Kim Il-sung's first wife, Kim Jong-suk. During his youth in the Soviet Union, Kim Jong-il was known as Yuri Irsenovich Kim (Юрий Ирсенович Ким), taking his patronymic from his father's Russified name, Ir-sen.

Kim was a young child when World War II ended in 1945. His father returned to Pyongyang in September 1945, and in late November the younger Kim returned to Korea via a Soviet ship that landed at Sonbong (Unggi). The family moved into a former Japanese officer's mansion in Pyongyang, with a garden and pool. Kim Jong-il's brother Shura Kim (also known as the first Kim Pyong-il) drowned there in 1948. In 1948, Kim Jong-il began primary school. In 1949, his mother died in pregnancy.

File:Kim-il-sung Kim-jong-suk Kim-jong-il.jpg

Three-year-old Kim Jong-il with his father Kim Il-sung and mother Kim Jong-suk in 1945.

Kim probably received most of his education in the People's Republic of China, where he was sent away from his father for safety during the Korean War. According to the official biography, he graduated from Namsan School in Pyongyang, a special school for the children of Worker's Party officials. He is later said to have attended Kim Il-sung University and to have majored in Political Economy, graduating in 1964. His graduating class won the highest academic honor, Double Chollima. By the time of his graduation, his father, revered in the government's official pronouncements as "the Great Leader" (위대한 수령, widaehan suryŏng), had firmly consolidated control over the government. He is also said to have received English language education at the University of Malta in the early 1970s, on his infrequent holidays in Malta as guest of Prime Minister Dom Mintoff.

The elder Kim had meanwhile remarried and had another son, Kim Pyong-il. It is unclear if Jong-il was chosen over Pyong-il, or whether Pyong-il was ever seriously considered as successor by his father. Since 1988, Kim Pyong-il has served in a series of North Korean embassies in Europe and is currently the North Korean ambassador to Poland. It is suspected that Kim Pyong-il was exiled to these distant posts by Kim Il-sung in order to avoid a power struggle between his two sons.

Ruler of FAGHOLE

Kim Il-sung died July 8, 1994, at age 82 of a heart attack. He was not replaced as President, and in fact remains the President resting in the memorial mausoleum in central Pyongyang. The active position has been abolished in deference to the memory of Kim Il-sung. Kim Jong-il officially took the titles of General Secretary of the Workers' Party of Korea and chairman of the National Defense Commission, the real centre of power in North Korea, on October 8, 1997. In 1998, this position was declared to be "the highest post of the state", so Kim may be regarded as North Korea's head of state from that date. This is the first, and so far only, time a socialist country's leadership has progressed in a dynastic succession. Since Kim is not the president, he is not constitutionally required to hold elections to confirm his legitimacy and has not done so.

The state-controlled economy continued to struggle throughout the 1990s as a result of poor industrial and agricultural productivity, the loss of guaranteed markets following the fall of the Soviet Union and the introduction of a market economy in China, and the state's continued large expenditures on armaments. As one analysis notes, "large-scale military spending eats up resources needed for investment and civilian consumption." (Exact figures for the scale of military spending as a proportion of the national economy are difficult to obtain due to the lack of reliable GDP data.) By 2000, there were frequent reports from reliable sources (such as the UN) of famine in all parts of the country except Pyongyang. North Korean citizens ran increasingly desperate risks to escape from the country, mainly into China.

On the domestic front, Kim has given occasional signs that he favours economic reforms similar to those carried out in China by Deng Xiaoping, and on visits to China he has expressed admiration for China's economic progress. In 2002, Kim Jong-il declared that "money should be capable of measuring the worth of all commodities." The Democratic People's Republic has begun limited market experimentation.

In the time span coinciding with Kim Dae-jung's visit to the North (see the section on international affairs below), North Korea introduced a number of economic changes, including price and wage increases (June 2002). Some analysts said that these measures were designed to lift production and rein in the black market. Kim announced plans to import and develop new technologies and ambitions to develop North Korea's fledgling software industry. Kaesong Industrial Park is being developed just north of the inter-Korean border, with the planned participation of 250 South Korean companies, employing 100,000 North Koreans, by 2007.

Kim's possible successor is a continuing topic of speculation. South Korean media have suggested that he is grooming his son, Kim Jong-chul. His eldest son, Kim Jong-nam, was earlier believed to be the designated heir, but he appears to have fallen out of favour after being arrested at Narita International Airport in Narita, Japan, near Tokyo, in 2001 while traveling on a forged passport.

On April 22 2004 a large explosion occurred at the Ryongch'ŏn train station nine hours after a train passed through the station returning Kim from his visit to China. The Red Cross reported 54 killed and 1,249 injured. Despite speculations of an assassination attempt at the time, South Korea later said it appeared to be an accident.

In November 2004 ITAR-TASS published reports that unnamed foreign diplomats in Pyongyang had observed the removal of portraits of Kim Jong-il around the country. The North Korean government has vigorously denied these reports. Radiopress, the Japanese radio monitoring agency, reported later that month that North Korean media stopped referring to Kim by the honorific "Dear Leader" and that instead Korean Central Television, the Korean Central News Agency and other media described him under "lesser" titles such as "General Secretary of the Workers' Party of Korea", "Chairman of the DPRK National Defense Commission", and "Supreme Commander of the Korean People's Army". It is unclear whether the possible curtailing of Kim's personality cult indicated a struggle within the North Korean leadership or whether it was a deliberate attempt by Kim to moderate his image in the outside world. Current KCTV news broadcasts make frequent use of honorifics such as "Great Leader," "Dear General," and "Dear Father," and occasionally "The Sun of the 21st Century."

Criticism

Kim Jong-il has been routinely criticised by world governments and international NGOs for human rights abuses carried out under his rule, as well as for North Korea's production of nuclear weapons, contrary to previous legal, international obligations under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and his own commitment to make the Korean Peninsula free of nuclear weapons.

Kim is widely labeled a dictatorial leader, whose regime cracks down harshly on any perceived form of dissent. Camp 22 is North Korea's largest concentration camp, where up to 50,000 men, women and children accused of political "crimes" are held. Reports of gross violations of human rights by the guards have been reported, such as murdering babies born to inmates..

Personal life

There is no official information available about the marital history of the leader of the secretive government, but Kim is widely believed to have been married three times. His last wife, Ko Young-hee (or Ko Yong Hi), reportedly died of cancer in 2004 . Since then, Kim has been living with Kim Ok, who had served as his personal secretary since the 1980s.

Kim was also married to ], although they have been estranged for some years. He has a daughter, Kim Sul-song (born 1974), from this marriage. His eldest son, Kim Jong-nam, was born to Song Hye-rim in 1971. With Ko Yong-Hi, he had another son, Kim Jong-chul, in 1981, and there is reported to be a second son, Kim Jong-un (name also spelled "Jong Woon" or "Jong Woong"). His second favorite mistress, Kyung-hwa Chang-ok had three children by him before she defected to South Korea in 2002. As of 2005, Kim Jong-chul was said to be his heir apparent. In all, Kim is reported to have fathered as many as eight children outside of marriage.

Like his father, Kim has a profound fear of flying, and has always traveled by private armoured train for state visits to Russia and China. The BBC reported that Konstantin Pulikovsky, a Russian emissary who traveled with Kim Jong-il across Russia by train, told reporters that Kim had live lobsters air-lifted to the train every day which he ate with silver chopsticks. (It is believed that silver chopsticks were used in the Chinese imperial palace to detect poison.)

Kim's reputation for personal extravagance is a focus of international attention on both the man and his country. In the context of United Nations sanctions restricting the trade in luxury items to North Korea following the country's October 2006 nuclear test, Reuters coverage noted that "No one enjoys luxury goods more than paramount leader Kim Jong-il, who boasts the country's finest wine cellar with space for 10,000 bottles. Kim has a penchant for fine food such as lobster, caviar and the most expensive cuts of sushi that he has flown in to him from Japan." His annual purchases of Hennessy's cognac reportedly total to $700,000, while the average North Korean earns the equivalent of $900 per year.

Kim is said to be a film fan, owning a collection of some 20,000 video tapes.. It has been reported that Kim is a fan of Friday The 13th, Rambo, James Bond films, Godzilla movies, among others. In 1978, on the orders of Kim, South Korean film director Shin Sang-ok and his actress wife Choe Eun-hui were kidnapped in order to build a North Korean film industry. In 2006 he was involved in the production of the Juche (self-reliance) based movie Diary of a Girl Student – depicting the life of a girl whose parents are scientists – with a KCNA news report stating that Kim "improved its script and guided its production".

Kim reportedly enjoys basketball. Former United States Secretary of State Madeleine Albright ended her summit with Kim by presenting him with a basketball signed by NBA legend Michael Jordan. Also an apparent golfer, North Korean state media reports that Kim routinely shoots three or four holes-in-one per round. They also say Kim has composed six operas

Notes and references

"Kim is a baby rattling the sides of a cot", Guardian Unlimited, Dec. 30, 2002.
Economy - Korea, North, CIA - The World Factbook, October 5, 2006.
SIPRI military expenditure database, Stockholm International Peace Research Institute
"On North Korea's streets, pink and tangerine buses", Christian Science Monitor, June 2, 2005.
"Economy root to N Korea crisis", BBC News, Apr. 12, 2005.
"Kaesong, model for Korean cooperation", Washington Times, May 28, 2005.
http://www.abc.net.au/worldtoday/stories/s289624.htm
hp&ex=1137214800&en=5eb1236d1e71df41&ei=5094&partner=homepage "A Mystery in China: Is North Korea's Leader in Town?", New York Times, January 13, 2006.
"Where Have All Kim Jong-il's Portraits Gone?", The Chosun Ilbo, Nov. 17, 2004.
Cite error: The named reference dear was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
"The case of Kim Jong-il's missing portraits", Asia Times, Nov. 20, 2004.
Removal of Kim Jong Il Portraits in North Korea Causes Speculation", Assoc. for Asian Research, Nov. 13, 2004.
^ N. Korean leader has secret 'wife', CNN.com, July 23, 2006
"Chairman Kim’s dissolving kingdom", The Sunday Times, January 30, 2005.
"Leadership Succession", GlobalSecurity.org.
"Profile: Kim Jong-il", BBC News, July 31, 2003.
"N. Korea's Kim may trade cognac for nuclear weapons", ABC News, October 13, 2006
"North Korean leader loves Hennessey, Bond movies", CNN.com, January 8, 2003
"North Korean leader loves Hennessey, Bond movies", CNN, Jan. 8, 2003
"The Madness of Kim Jong Il", Guardian Unlimited, November 2, 2003.
"Kidnapped by North Korea", BBC News, March 5, 2003.
"Film 'Diary of a Girl Student', Close Companion of Life", KCNA, August 10, 2006.
http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/world/20061029-9999-1n29kim.html
http://www.worldtribune.com/worldtribune/WTARC/2004/ea_nkorea_06_16.html

External links

Template:Nndb name
Template:PDFlink – Foreign Languages Publishing House, Pyongyang DPR Korea (1998)
Born in the USSR – Kim Jong-il's childhood.
The case of Kim Jong-il's missing portraits analysis by Kosuke Takahashi (November 20, 2004)
The many family secrets of Kim Jong Il
BBC Profile of Kim Jong-il
"Hidden Daughter" Visits Kim Jong-il Every Year (also includes photos of Kim during his youth)
Death of Kim's consort: Dynastic implications
Template:Ko icon Kim's family tree

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