North Korean leader Kim Jong Un appears to be escalating efforts to keep the country under his thumb, with latest reports indicating that one long-serving key official has been executed and others sent for re-education.
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More than 100 military and party officials are believed to have been executed since Kim Jong-un took power in late 2011, … and experts say the brutality will continue to ensure his officials’ loyalty.
Kim Yong Jin, vice-premier of the North’s Cabinet, was executed, said the South’s Ministry of Unification (MoU) during a regular news briefing on Wednesday.
On Tuesday, South Korea’s mass-read daily JoongAng Ilbo reported that two senior officials were publicly executed by an anti-aircraft gun.
According to the reports that said by the officials to media, “Kim Yong-Jin was criticized for his bad sitting posture on the platform during an assembly of parliament of North Korea and then went through a questioning session that exposed others”.
A source said it is usually hard to independently verify news about top officials in the country or the inner circle around the leader. “He was later accused of being anti-revolutionary following a probe and a firing squad execution was carried out in July”. The letters read ” North Korea has executed Kim Yong Jin and banished Kim Yong Chol and Choe Hwi.
It was earlier reported that Ri Yong Jin, a senior official at the education ministry, was sentenced to death after he fell asleep in a meeting being addressed by Kim Jong-un.
If reports of Kim Yong Jin’s execution are accurate, it could signal that Kim Jong Un is taking a tougher stance on those at the top of his fragile authoritarian regime.
A former defence minister, Hyun Yong Chol, is also believed to have been executed past year for treason, according to the South’s spy agency.
“But the intensity of the reign of terror depends on changes to the internal and external political environment”, Cheong said.
In December 2013, North Korea conducted the high-profile execution of Jang, citing charges of treason.
It noted that the news of the reclusive state’s new purges came shortly after the South Kores, disclosed that the North Korea’s deputy ambassador in London had defected and arrived in the country with his family.
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About 10 North Korean diplomats made it to the South in the first half of this year alone, Yonhap said, quoting informed sources.
