North Korea’s Kim Jong Un reveals daughter at missile launch - Al Jazeera English

2 years ago 36

Photos released by North Korean quality bureau are archetypal authoritative confirmation of the beingness of Kim Jong Un’s daughter.

Published On 19 Nov 2022

North Korean person Kim Jong Un has presented his girl to the satellite for the archetypal clip successful striking photos showing the brace hand-in-hand inspecting the motorboat of an intercontinental ballistic rocket (ICBM).

North’s authoritative Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) said connected Saturday that Kim Jong Un had attended the test-firing of the ICBM “together with his beloved girl and wife”.

Photos released by KCNA were the archetypal authoritative confirmation of the beingness of the North Korean leader’s daughter.

KCNA did not sanction the girl, who is seen successful photographs successful a achromatic puffy overgarment holding hands with her begetter arsenic they look to inspect a massive Hwasong-17 intercontinental ballistic rocket (ICBM).

North Korean person Kim Jong Un inspects an intercontinental ballistic rocket (ICBM) with photograph released connected November 19, 2022 by North Korea's Korean Central News Agency (KCNA). KCNA via REUTERS ATTENTION EDITORS - THIS IMAGE WAS PROVIDED BY A THIRD PARTY. NO THIRD PARTY SALES. SOUTH KOREA OUT. NO COMMERCIAL OR EDITORIAL SALES IN SOUTH KOREA. REUTERS IS UNABLE TO INDEPENDENTLY VERIFY THIS IMAGE.

North Korea launched what it said was a Hwasong-17 ICBM connected Friday. The rocket travelled 1,000km (622 miles) connected a lofted trajectory, and landed astir 200km (124 miles) westbound of Oshima-Oshima land successful the bluish prefecture of Hokkaido, according to Japanese officials.

South Korea’s Yonhap News Agency said connected Saturday that, earlier the merchandise of photographs connected Saturday, it was lone speculated that Kim and his woman Ri Sol Ju had 3 children, calved successful 2010, 2013 and 2017.

The lone erstwhile confirmation that the mates had children had travel from erstwhile NBA prima Dennis Rodman, who made a quixotic sojourn to Pyongyang successful 2013 and claimed helium had met Kim’s daughter.

After his travel to North Korea that year, Rodman told The Guardian paper that helium had spent clip with Kim and his family, and held their baby. Rodman said Kim had a “baby” girl named Ju Ae, who is estimated to present beryllium astir 12 oregon 13 years of age.

The North Korean person was “a bully dad”, Rodman said astatine the time.

Kim – the grandson of North Korea’s founding person Kim Il Sung and the 3rd procreation of the Kim household to pb the country – joined Ri Sol Ju, successful 2009, according to Seoul’s spy agency.

North Korean person Kim Jong Un, with his woman Ri Sol Ju, speaks connected the time of the motorboat of an intercontinental ballistic rocket (ICBM) successful this undated photograph released connected November 19, 2022 by North Korea's Korean Central News Agency (KCNA). KCNA via REUTERS ATTENTION EDITORS - THIS IMAGE WAS PROVIDED BY A THIRD PARTY. NO THIRD PARTY SALES. SOUTH KOREA OUT. NO COMMERCIAL OR EDITORIAL SALES IN SOUTH KOREA. REUTERS IS UNABLE TO INDEPENDENTLY VERIFY THIS IMAGE.

To present his girl to the satellite astatine this juncture could beryllium designed to nonstop an planetary connection that the North Korean authorities is present to stay, Soo Kim, a erstwhile CIA expert present with the RAND Corporation, told the Agence France-Presse quality agency.

“In a way, it’s a symbolic representation of Kim passing the sceptre of regularisation to the adjacent generation,” Soo Kim said, adding that the photos besides suggest “a grade of closeness and comfortableness betwixt Kim and his daughter”, which could bespeak that she is being groomed for aboriginal leadership.

The photographs whitethorn besides beryllium portion of a cautiously stage-managed effort by Pyongyang to amusement Kim is simply a “normal” leader, North Korean studies student Ahn Chan-il told AFP.

“Pyongyang seems to beryllium trying to marque itself arsenic a ‘normal’ federation – portion conducting these ICBM launches that amusement disconnected its subject prowess – by showing images of Kim being a seemingly loving father,” Ahn said.

“It is besides a motion of stabilising the authorities by declaring to the extracurricular satellite that it is present heading for its fourth-generation succession and that it is well-prepared for it.”