TOKYO — North Korea’s state news agency on Thursday published a photograph of Kim Jong-Un, revealing to the outside world the image of a man whose face hadn’t been seen in roughly 15 years.
The photo’s publication, according to experts, qualified as another benchmark in the unveiling of Kim Jong-Il’s youngest son and presumed successor.
The photo, first published in North Korea’s official Workers’ Party newspaper, the Rodung Shinmun, shows Kim Jong-Un sitting on a red chair, surrounded by attendees from Pyongyang’s recent political conference. He has chubby cheeks, reminiscent of his grandfather, North Korean founder Kim Il-Sung. His mouth is pursed. He is wearing a black Maoist-style track suit. His hair is parted in the middle. Dozens of delegates stand behind him. Two seats to the left of the Young General sits Kim Jong-Il.
Other political moves
Until this week, Kim Jong-Un qualified as the best-concealed figure in the world’s most secretive state. As part of its Workers’ Party conference in Pyongyang, though, North Korea issued strong signals for a father-to-son power transfer. According to North Korea’s news agency, Kim Jong-Un was named vice chairman of the Central Military Commission. He was also named to the Central Committee and given rank as a four-star general.
Prior to the conference, North Korean media had never printed Kim Jong-Un’s name. Despite a paparazzi- style chase among South Korean and Japanese media, nobody yet had uncovered a photo of Kim Jong-Un as an adult. Within the last two years, two Japanese media outlets thought they found photos of him. Turned out, they had photos of a middle-aged construction worker and a young factory manager.
Some Seoul-based experts emphasized the significance of the released photo, in part because North Korea cares very much about the faces of its leaders. North Korean soldiers wear pins showing the faces of Kim Jong-Il and Kim Il-Sung. Portraits of both Kims must be displayed in every North Korean home.
“From the photo release, we can assume Kim Jong-Un is going to start making many public appearances related to his position as the successor and as a party and military official,” said Yang Moo-Jin, an expert at Seoul’s University of North Korean Studies.
Front-page news
The dearth of earlier Kim Jong-Un photos forced media outlets on the only thing they had: A confirmed photo of Jong-Un, fleshy face at an angle, wearing a black turtleneck. Experts guess the photo shows him as a 12-year-old. Wednesday, reporting party conference news from Pyongyang, all of Seoul’s major papers ran the same photograph on the front page.
Kim Jong-Un is believed to be 26 or 27.
