Kim Jong-un Keeps Uncle in Check
By Kim Myong-song
February 06, 2017 12:29
Kim Pyong-il
North Korean leader Kim Jong-un in early 2015 shunted his uncle Kim Pyong-il from his perennial post as ambassador to Poland to the Czech Republic to weaken his position, sources say.
Kim Pyong-il (63), a half-brother of Kim Jong-il, had been ambassador to Poland for 16 years and had an entrenched network of connections there.
The source said Kim Pyong-il was poised to become dean of the diplomatic corps in Warsaw when the incumbent left in late 2014.
The position, which is customarily held by the longest-serving envoy, would have meant hosting various diplomatic events and cementing his status as an influential player on the international stage. Kim Jong-un apparently wanted to avoid this and decided to shunt his uncle abruptly to the Czech Republic.
Kim Pyong-il was born to regime founder Kim Il-sung and his second wife Kim Song-ae.
He was at one point involved in a power struggle with his half-brother but was then sent into cushioned exile, spending altogether 38 years abroad, first as a military attaché in the embassy in Yugoslavia in 1979.
"The presence of Kim Pyong-il, who resembles Kim Il-sung, must be a threat to Kim Jong-un, who is trying to win people's hearts by imitating his grandfather," speculated a researcher at a government-funded think tank here. "It seems the regime has sent a senior officer from the State Security Department to Prague to watch him."
Hong Kong media last year reported that there was a movement among senior defectors to form a government-in-exile with Kim Pyong-il as its head.
Tiger - here’s what I don’t understand: how can North Korea have such horrible leaders? It’s not like the people are low IQ losers...trapped in cultures they’re too stupid to overcome. That’s not the issue.
These folks are blood related of the people in South Korea, right?
Do Koreans have a unusually strong ‘respect’ for authority figures? Some cultural kink that allowed good people to allow corrupt totalitarian systems to continue for decades?