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SEOUL: When North Korea broke a three-week silence on leader Kim Jong Un’s public activity on Saturday (May 2), it offered no clue as to where he was during a period of intense global speculation about his health and whereabouts, or why he was hidden from the public for so long
Instead, state media simply showed him surrounded by aides and confidently in a gleaming fertilizer factory that outside experts believe is part of a secret nuclear weapons program.
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While there is still a lot of mystery about Kim’s condition, the abrupt reappearance of the laid-back, smiling leader was a clear choreography of the secret government’s key messages: Kim is the supreme leader in total control of an urge to improve food security and the country’s poverty economy, amid harsh international sanctions and the threat of the new coronavirus.
READ: North Korea’s Kim Jong Un makes first public appearance in 20 days: State media
WORLD NEWS CENTER
The official newspaper Rodong Sinmun devoted three of its six pages on Saturday to promoting Kim’s leadership, attributing to him what he called prosperity and self-sufficiency.
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Reuters was unable to verify the accuracy of official accounts or the authenticity of images from the event.
The expanding complex is the result of Kim’s vision to build a modern factory to support agricultural production and progress in automating his chemical industry, said Pak Pong Ju, a party elder and a faithful aide to Kim, at the ribbon cut where Kim reappeared.
After weeks of rumors that North Korean leader Kim Jong Un was seriously ill or even dead, state media released photos showing him in public. AFP / STR
North Korea is under sanctions for its nuclear weapons and missile programs, leaving the country chronically struggling with food shortages, compounded by bad weather and mismanagement.
Kim’s appearance at the Sunchon fertilizer plant, which official media reported on Friday, was an example of “field orientation,” a key part of Kim’s public persona, where he chairs an event at a major industrial project. or social, or at other times in military exercises involving strategic weapons such as ballistic missiles or tactical warfare.
His second public visit this year to the site, 50 kilometers north of the capital Pyongyang, included a sizeable audience of officials from the army, the Workers’ Party and the local community. Many wore face masks in apparent precaution against the coronavirus.
“Agricultural production is a top priority, which has a direct impact on people’s lives,” said Koh Yu-hwan, president of the Korea Institute for National Unification, a group of experts from the Korean government. South.
Koh said Kim’s sudden return was “a strategy to be at the center of world news without resorting to nuclear or missile tests.”
This image taken on May 1, 2020 and published by North Korea’s Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) on May 2, 2020 shows North Korean leader Kim Jong Un visiting the Suchon phosphate fertilizer factory in the province of South Pyongan, North Korea. (Photo: STR / KCNA VIA KNS / AFP)
ENTERTAINMENT
The composition of Kim’s entourage featured familiar faces at such events, including two at the forefront of the Northern years’ drive to improve economic conditions: former Prime Minister Pak Pong Ju, who is Kim’s deputy on the Affairs Committee of the State, and Pak’s successor as Prime Minister Kim Jae Ryong.
The couple had accompanied Kim on their last major field guide, the March opening of the General Hospital in Pyongyang.
For Kim Jong Un’s immediate right on the podium was his sister, Kim Yo Jong, deputy head of the party’s Central Committee and unofficially her brother’s chief of staff.
READ: Why is North Korean leader Kim Jong Un’s health important?
SECRET PROJECT
The phosphate fertilizer factory in Sunchon, under construction since June 2017, has received much attention from North Korean leaders, with multiple visits from Kim Jae Ryong and Pak.
International observers say the plant is part of the North’s clandestine search for uranium mining for use in nuclear weapons, as the mineral may be a by-product of phosphate fertilizer manufacturing.
There is strong evidence that the factory is involved in uranium mining, a report this month from the California-based Center for Nonproliferation Studies said in line with Kim’s policy of seeking economic and military strength.
The North is motivated to use the plant because it is profitable and can easily hide uranium enrichment, which Pyongyang has always tried to hide, according to the report. Uranium enrichment offers an alternative to the processing of plutonium as fuel for nuclear weapons.
