North Korea strives to idolise
- Published: 25/12/2011 at 01:52 AM BEIJING : North Korea has stepped up a campaign through its official media to idolise Kim Jong-Un, the third and youngest son and heir-apparent of the late North Korean leader Kim Jong-Il.
In a show of loyalty to Kim Jong-Un, the official Korean Central News Agency quoted Pyongyang citizens in a report Friday as saying how much they appreciate the state distribution of fish, an order reportedly issued by Kim Jong-Il a day before his death of a heart attack on Dec. 17.
"Respected Comrade Kim Jong-Un, who has been overcome with the deepest grief at his (father's) demise, took all necessary measures to truck fresh fish to the capital city in time and supply the fish to the citizens even in the mourning period," Ri Chun-Guk, a vice department director of the Pyongyang City People's Committee, was quoted as saying.
"Officials in the commercial service field in the city pledged their loyalty for Kim Jong-Un, saying the history of loving care for the people continues and no people on earth are blessed with leaders and generals as the Koreans," KCNA said.
According to KCNA, government authorities began supplying fish such as pollack and herring to the citizens of Pyongyang on Thursday, in what analysts saw as a "special distribution" to commemorate the 94th anniversary of the birthday of Kim Jong-Suk, mother of Kim Jong-Il, as well as the 20th anniversary of the appointment of Kim Jong-Il as supreme commander of the Korean People's Army.
"The loving care of Kim Jong-Il should reach the people as soon as possible even though it is a mourning period," Kim Jong-Un was quoted as saying, making it the first time that North Korean media have reported his remarks.
In an unusual move, KCNA on Friday carried a comment by a US White House spokesman in reference to Kim Jong-Un in an apparent attempt to publicise at home and abroad that even the United States, which confronts North Korea over nuclear and other issues, recognises the young Kim as the North's new leader.
"Kim Jong-Il had designated Kim Jong-Un as his official successor, and at this time we have no indication that has changed," White House Press Secretary Jay Carney told journalists in Washington on Wednesday in response to a question over rumours of a collective leadership in North Korea.
In yet another drive to show Kim Jong-Un as the new leader, the North's Korean Central Television broadcast images of him greeting Pyongyang-based diplomats and others who paid their respects to his father, who meanwhile lay in state under glass at the Kumsusan Memorial Palace in Pyongyang.
North Korea watchers expect the domestic media will continue to play up the status of Kim Jong-Un as new leader in the run-up to Kim Jong-Il's funeral on Wednesday, and a national memorial service the following day.
The funeral "will be conceived primarily to reassure the North Korean public about the continuity of the Kim dynasty, and thus some of the most powerful figures in the regime may not be prominent," said Paul Stares, director of the Center for Preventive Action at the US-based think tank Council on Foreign Relations.
"Two approaching events might give us some clues. The first is the annual New Year's Day message to the people that has traditionally been used to articulate national goals and announce new initiatives," Stares wrote in a commentary published in the Friday issue of the Herald Tribune.
The second event, he argued, will be Kim Jong-Un's 29th birthday on Jan 8. "How this day is managed and what statements are released to mark the event could be equally revealing."
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