Translated material
Chairman - senior leader
North Korea upgrades leader's status
North Korean leader Kim Jong Il, 67, has become the country's "supreme leader." This role is assigned to him in the updated constitution of the DPRK, which has found itself in the center of attention of the world media these days. Previously, the North Korean leader enjoyed the status of “respected leader”, not enshrined in the constitution, and held the official post of chairman of the State Defense Committee (GKO).And now the Basic Law has determined that the chairman of the State Defense Committee “is the supreme leader of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea.” The new version of the constitution also clarifies the responsibilities of the “supreme leader,” who “directs all affairs of the state, appoints and removes key leaders in the field of defense, and approves or annuls important treaties with foreign states.”
Kim Jong Il is already the most powerful figure in North Korea, isolated from the outside world. According to foreign analysts, changes in the constitution are associated with the desire of the DPRK leadership to consolidate supreme power against the backdrop of periodically emerging rumors about the deteriorating health of the leader and the transfer of powers to one of his sons. The surge in international discontent with Pyongyang’s reluctance to abandon the development of its nuclear missile program also played a role. It is no coincidence that the priority of the state in the constitution is the strengthening of military power and the development of the defense industry.
Leading researcher at the Center for Korean Studies at the Institute of Far Eastern Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Konstantin Asmolov, noted to Vremya Novostei that changes to the DPRK constitution were made back in April of this year. However, the South Korean Yonhap agency and the Seoul Ministry of Unification Affairs, cited by the world media, “for some reason only noticed this now.”
This “sluggishness,” according to the expert, is not accidental. With the coming to power in Seoul in 2007 of the right-wing conservative Great Country Party, supporters of inter-Korean dialogue were pushed to the political margins. “The professionalism of diplomats and intelligence officers has dropped sharply,” notes the VN expert, as the South Korean rightists carried out a large-scale purge of the Foreign Ministry, intelligence and other key departments. Now “the analysis of the situation in the North is entrusted to officials who were not in the know for the previous ten years.”
Foreign media reports that the word “communism” has disappeared from the new constitution of the DPRK caused bewilderment among the expert. “In fact, nothing was said about communism in the previous version of the 1998 constitution. The North Koreans have not resorted to it for a very long time, preferring “socialism” or “Juche ideas,” Mr. Asmolov explained to VN.
Our interlocutor suggested that this “news” was born from a report by the South Korean Yonhap agency - Kim Jong Il allegedly said that the DPRK will now build socialism, because the ideals of communism are very difficult to achieve. The agency's source was a North Korean official who stated this in a private conversation. “The world media mixed these fabrications into the constitution. As a result, it turned out that the North Koreans crossed out from it what was never in it,” the expert concluded.