North Korea’s state media has released new photos of supreme leader Kim Jong UN amid rumours of his deteriorating health, underscoring how little the world knows about the secretive state.
Recently, reports stating Kim Jong Un is in come surfaced after an ex-South Korean diplomat claimed to have gotten the information from China.
Now, the pictures released by Kim’s regime appear to put rumours to an end as they show the 36-year-old looking in the pink of health while he held a meeting on Tuesday of the poiltburo of the workers party to call for prevention efforts against the coronavirus and typhoon Bhavi, Korean Central News Agency.
The meeting assessed “some defects in the state emergency anti-epidemic work for checking the inroads of the malignant virus,” KCNA said in a statement.
The pictures still remain suspicious as they were syndicated through the Associated Press which said no independent journalist was allowed to attend the meeting. And going by the history, it is not new for North Korea to manipulate state media reports for political purposes.
The confusion remain reminiscent after Seoul-based news site Daily NK reported in April that Kim had undergone what they said was a failed “cardiovascular surgical procedure”, leaving him bed ridden. The statement was supported by his less public appearances this year including events honoring his grandfather. But North Korea in their own subtlety refuted rumours by releasing pictures of the leader looking healthy during inauguration of a fertilizer factory in May. However the South Korean diplomat has claimed that his subsequent public appearances were previously recorded.
Meanwhile, North Korea on Wednesday issued alert for most regions in preparation for Typhoon Bavi, which is set to hit the country later this week.
North Korean daily, the Rodong Sinumun, reported that various sectors are rolling out damage prevention before the typhoon hist the country. These sectors include coal mining and extractive industries, thermopower and hydropower.
In other news related to North Korea, the country hasn’t reported a single case of the novel coronavirus that has claimed hundreds of thousand lives worldwide. The country had, however, enforced strict lockdown in Pyongnang in July after what they said was first suspected case of coronavirus. The reports of the suspected case were indecisive.
