TOKYO — North Korean leader Kim Jong Il will probably use an upcoming meeting of party elites to introduce his heir apparent, initiating the Stalinist dictatorship’s second hereditary power transfer, U.S. and South Korean experts and officials say.
Kim’s youngest son, Kim Jong Eun, is widely expected to be given at least one high-level leadership position — the first step to claiming absolute power on par with his father’s.
Experts differ on whether the younger Kim’s rise will be publicly heralded. But in any case, moves made in coming days could lend the first real insight into Kim Jong Il’s strategy for maintaining his family’s power as his country deals with a frail economy, severe food shortages and international pressure to denuclearize.
North Korea has not announced dates for the party delegates meeting in Pyongyang, a rare forum reserved for landmark decision-making. Good Friends, a Seoul-based humanitarian group with ties to the North, said it would begin Saturday. Other experts predicted it would open Monday, with Kim Jong Eun being promoted on the final day. North Korea celebrates the anniversary of its founding Thursday.
Observers say that the elder Kim, who suffered a stroke in 2008, is rushing the power transfer because of health problems. Kim Jong Eun is thought to be in his mid- or late 20s.
“This conference would be an opportunity to lay the foundation of the post-Kim Jong Il era,” said Kim Heung-kyu, a professor at Sungshin Women’s University in Seoul.
North Korea held similar delegates’ conferences in 1958 and 1966.
Such meetings provide latitude for adjusting the balance of power between the military and Workers’ Party.
