North Korea Appears To Be Readying Accession of Dictator’s Daughter — Age 10

North Korea is promoting leader Kim Jong-un’s 10-year-old daughter as if she were already in a position of power as his anointed successor.Pyongyang this week introduced five postage stamps showing Kim Ju-ae with her father at the November test-firing of the North’s latest, most powerful missile, the Hwasong-17. It’s too soon to say that the second of Mr. Kim’s three children will succeed him, but South Korea’s Yonhap News says the North “appears to be displaying her legitimacy as a descendant of the ‘Paektu bloodline.’”That’s a reference to the mystique that Mr. Kim’s grandfather, Kim Il-sung — the founder of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, North Korea’s formal name — made his headquarters on the Korean peninsula’s highest peak, Mount Paektu on the border with China, while fighting the Japanese. According to the mythology, his son, Kim Jong-il, Mr. Kim’s father, was born there. (Actually, Kim Il-sung hung out in the Siberian city of Khabarovsk, where Kim Jong-il was born.)The stamps were issued along with a 100-page book named “the people sing of Mount Paektu,” showing Ju-ae’s mother, Ri Sol-ju, and her husband beside a stream on the sacred mountain. Another image shows them with soldiers in winter uniforms — all to elevate the image of Ju-ae’s mother, a singer in a band when Mr. Kim met her.In addition to featuring Kim Ju-ae with her father on the series of stamps, North Korean image- and myth-makers are thinking of just about every other way to show the child’s importance in the hierarchy. They’re now saying a white horse shown in last week’s parade on the 75th anniversary of the founding of the North Korean armed forces belongs to Kim Ju-ae. She’s not shown riding the horse, similar to the one on which her father was seen galloping through the snow on Paektu four years ago, but the noble beast was reported as “most loved” by Ju-ae. Russia in recent years has bequeathed North Korea dozens of white horses, symbols of state power.Already, as a sure sign of Ju-ae’s ranking, there can be only one girl named Ju-ae in North Korea. Radio Free Asia, funded by Washington, reports North Korean authorities are forcing everyone with her name to take new ones. It should be noted that North Korea has not yet publicly announced Ju-ae’s name, but that is bound to happen. North Korea has long since banned use of the same given names as those of Kim Il-sung, Kim Jong-il, and Kim Jong-un.For sure, RFA said, Kim Ju-ae is destined for “an important role to play either as a politician, a propaganda tool, or both.” She’s now called “respected daughter,” just as her father is called “respected.” For Ju-ae, that’s a significant step above “noble” or “beloved,” as she’s also been known.

North Korea Appears To Be Readying Accession of Dictator’s Daughter — Age 10

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