Succession story 'shakes up' Pyongyang By Sunny Lee
BEIJING - Here we go once again with the North Korean heir game. This time, it
was South Korea's Yonhap news agency that blew the whistle, generating a
stampede of journalists trying to get ahead in the hottest and most tantalizing
beat in the world.
Citing "well-informed" and "multiple intelligence" sources, Yonhap reported
that North Korea's supreme leader Kim Jong-il had designated his third son,
Jong-un, as the next ruler of the world's most mysterious country.
The ensuing media buzz over Kim's crown affairs is understandable. The
succession of power in the unfathomable regime is a key political event that
will transform the contours of
North Korea's power topography as well as the regional political landscape.
Since the reported designation, however, there has been no distinct change in
North Korea, where the Dear Leader's word is law. If Kim really had made the
decision, North Korea would likely have gone into an all-out propaganda
campaign in praise of the new heir apparent. So far, Pyongyang has been calm as
usual.
What is even stranger is that most experts on North Korea have remained cool,
little swayed by the latest news. A remarkably large number of observers on
North Korea have cast doubt on the credibility of the report.
"North Korea is like a black box. Any analysis on North Korea is a guess. You
shouldn't make an analysis based on a guess," said Chu Shulong, a professor of
political science at Tsinghua University in Beijing. Cheon Seong-whun, a senior
research fellow at the Korea Institute for National Unification, said, "That's
what Yonhap reported. I am not sure whether that's true or not."
Cheong Seong-chang, director of the Inter-Korean Relations Studies Program at
the Sejong Institute, a think-tank, estimates the accuracy of the report to be
about 50% or 60%. "It's hard to give more credit than that," he said. Shi
Yinhong of Renmin University in China said, "Both inside and outside hearsay
reports about North Korea's heir are untrustworthy."
Queries to other North Korean observers, such as Jang Song-hyon, a former
president of the Royal Asiatic Society of Korea in Seoul, Zhu Feng, a
well-known security expert at Peking University, as well as Shen Dingli,
executive dean of the Institute of International Studies at Fudan University in
Shanghai, all came back with disbelief about the newly alleged heir.
The American government-supported Radio Free Asia joined the untrusting
pronouncement, citing Ken Gause of the CNA Corporation, a think-tank that does
work for the Pentagon, Rudiger Frank, an Austrian expert on North Korea, and
Bruce Klingner of the Brookings Institution.
The media firestorm finally slowed only when Kim's eldest son, Jong-nam, showed
up in person on Saturday to explain to reporters that his father has yet to
make the final appointment. "Only the father will make the decision," he said.
Who was Yonhap's source?
Going back to the much-cited and widely spread Yonhap report, a journalist from
the Middle East has identified that a key mystery remains. Specifically, who
was the source behind the report? Yonhap's lengthy report carried seemingly
authoritative sources, but cited them anonymously. The tip may have emanated
from South Korea's intelligence services.
Still, a knowledgeable person in Seoul said Yonhap was very "confident" about
the report. This information emerged even after the South Korean government
issued the customary and politically correct statement that "it doesn't have
any information on the matter".
A veteran South Korean journalist who closely follows North Korean news said in
private that the fact Yonhap cited "multiple intelligence sources" goes against
the "common sense" of covering the secretive country. "My experience tells me
that when a North Korean news [report] is accurate, it has only one source.
North Korea is very secretive. Very few people know what's going on there. It's
especially the case when it comes to the heir appointment. If they have
'multiple sources', then my gut tells me that I don't have to trust it," he
said.
"The news may have been sowed intentionally," he added.
Pyongyang is said to have made extensive efforts to assure a smooth transition
of power transition after North Korean leaders saw the collapse of the former
Soviet Union. According to observers, North Korea believed that the demise of
the Soviet Union was brought about because Moscow had failed to adequately
address the issue of succession.
In Pyongyang's case, reality may betray the best intentions. Some feel that the
numerous hearsay reports surrounding the North Korean heir indicate that some
close associates to Kim Jong-il are engaged in some kind of power struggle or
political jockeying. Maybe the conflicting reports are evidence that different
factions are using propaganda to back their favorite sons.
But this chance is less likely, as one observer puts it, because "Kim Jong-il
is known to watch CNN regularly. He will soon hear about the 'new heir' that he
himself didn't make a decision upon. The consequence will be brutal."
Pyongyang sees the South Korean news report as nothing but propaganda fed by
the South Korean government in a plot to "divide" the North Korean ruling class
as its supreme leader mulls his choice of successor. North Korea must be
unhappy with the report because it gives the impression that there is a "mole"
within the Pyongyang leadership who leaked the secret to the world.
North Korea also fears that such "outside" news could destabilize a nation in
which Kim is deified, and where any change of leadership should be announced
directly from him. The news has made North Korea's leadership very angry and
extremely edgy.
As a North Korean source put it, the leaked story was meant to "shake the
system"; to profess false knowledge about the internal heir-selection progress
and to test how cohesive the ruling class remains in this volatile transitional
period.
Because of this, some analysts believe the Yonhap report was disinformation
intentionally "sowed" by unnamed South Korean intelligence agents.
Sunny Lee is a Seoul-born writer and journalist. He is a graduate of
Harvard University and Beijing Foreign Studies University. He can be reached at
boston.sunny@yahoo.com
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