South Korean officials now think Kim Jong-un’s daughter is his heir apparent

Kim Jong-un has dropped some of the strongest hints yet about who will be his successor as hereditary ruler of North Korea, after a year marked by more than a dozen public appearances by his daughter Kim Ju-ae.

Leadership of the hermit kingdom has so far exclusively been passed down the male side of the Kim dynasty, with Kim Jong-un having been groomed for many years to succeed his father Kim Jong-il, who was the eldest son of the country’s founder Kim Il-sung.

Yet, Kim Jong-un’s first-born child, believed by South Korean analysts to be a son aged around 13, has never been acknowledged or named in public, while the North Korean leader introduced his daughter Ju-ae, aged around 10, to the public at a missile launch in November 2022.

Since then she has appeared alongside her father during many of the country’s most significant occasions, featuring prominently in state media coverage that the regime knows will then be reported around the world. From launches to military parades and visits to government facilities, Ju-ae has made a total of 19 appearances in just over a year since her public debut.

The rate and significance of these appearances, as well as the way she is referenced by state-controlled media as “beloved child” or “respected child”, have led many analysts and observers to the assumption that she is being groomed to succeed Kim.

Initially sceptical about the possibility of Kim naming a daughter as his heir, South Korean officials are now reconsidering that stance.

South Korean lawmaker Yoo Sang-bum said in March, after a closed-door briefing by the National Intelligence Service (NIS), that the agency believed that Kim, who is around 39 years old, was too young and healthy to even consider succession plans.

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But on 3 December NIS chief Cho Tae-yong said it is now believed in Seoul that Kim Ju-ae could be the heir apparent. The unusually candid comments from the intelligence chief were made on the KBS television programme.

South Korea’s Unification Ministry, which deals with North Korea, also appeared to walk back on its initial scepticism and said it sees signs that Kim’s daughter could be the next in line.

On 12 December, unification minister Kim Yung-ho said pictures in Pyongyang’s state media were “an indication that the North Korean leader is trying to demonstrate his will for succession” and said it was an “escalating level of protocol”.

“You can see from state media images that when she visited the Naval Command in August and then the Air Force Command on 30 November, the commanders and officers were all saluting her,” he said.

He also referred to pictures from North Korea’s Founding Day military parade on 9 September which showed North Korean military leader Park Jong Chon, a close associate of Kim, kneeling and whispering into the girl’s ears.

“If we look at these things, we cannot rule out the possibility of Ju-ae’s succession to power given that they are putting her on the main stage so early. We will need to keep a close watch on this,” the unification ministry official said.

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Any succession plan in North Korea is of significant geopolitical interest, and the prospect of Kim’s daughter assuming a prominent role adds a layer of intrigue to the complex political landscape in the region.

Hyun In-ae, a professor of North Korean Studies at Ewha Womans University in South Korea, told Korea Times that acceptance of Kim’s daughter by the military leadership would be difficult in the country’s patriarchal society but agreed that there were strong signs.

“Many would feel strange about Kim taking his daughter everywhere and showing up with her at major events,” the professor said. “All I can say now is that if someone is introduced as ‘General Morning Star’ or something similar, this means she is almost certainly a successor or someone with a status akin to that.”

Ju-ae was pictured holding her father’s arm when she made her first public appearance in November last year at the launch of an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM). Wearing a white puffer jacket with red ballet pumps and a ponytail, she stayed close to Kim as they walked around the Hwasong-17 missile.

She is the first of Kim’s children to be photographed in public with her father, as state media had previously avoided even revealing the identity of members of the leader’s immediate family.

With each appearance, her stature within the regime appears to have grown.

The reference to her as “noble child” was upgraded to “General Morning Star” in state media following the successful launch of North Korea’s first spy satellite on 21 November, seen by analysts as another significant development.

The title was initially bestowed upon her great-grandfather, Kim Il-sung, the founder of the North Korean regime. Later, it was also used for her father, Kim, before he assumed power in 2011 during his twenties.

The girl no longer wears a ponytail as she was seen a year ago and instead sports a half-tie hairstyle like her mother Ri Sol-ju and a leather jacket, an item of clothing Kim also regularly favours.

Unification ministry official Kim Yung-ho said that early succession planning could be Kim’s way to ensure stability amid signs of a shift in loyalty towards the family that has been ruling over the country for decades.

“With the Korean Wave culture spreading in North Korea, we are seeing signs that North Koreans are starting to move away from their loyalty to the regime. With this fourth succession, the regime is trying to strengthen its internal solidarity,” he said.

Last month North Korean state media reported on a slight decrease in voter turnout for an election for deputies to regional people’s assemblies, down at 99.63 per cent from a claimed 99.98 per cent four years earlier. While the numbers are absurdly high for a supposedly democratic exercise, the very fact that a slight drop was reported has been seen as a significant admission by the regime.

“Among the voters who took part in the ballot-casting, 99.91 per cent voted for the candidates for deputies to provincial people’s assemblies... (and) 99.87 per cent voted for candidates for deputies to city and county people’s assemblies,” state news agency KCNA said.

With so little known about Kim’s other children – he is also believed to have a third born in 2017 – the only other named contender for the succession at this stage is Kim’s firebrand sister Kim Yo-jong, rumoured to be his de facto second-in-command.

Some analysts have also speculated that Kim’s eldest child is being deliberately shielded from the public gaze so that he can be presented as heir when he is ready, and that he will eventually lead the patriarchal regime.

But Kim’s school friend Joao Micaelo told Radio Free Asia in an interview in May that the dictator may not actually have fathered a son at all, as he never mentioned a male offspring during their conversations.

Mr Micaelo, who long claimed that he attended school with Kim in Switzerland in 1998, said the North Korean leader spoke about his daughter with whom he has been seen publicly, and even his wife, but never mentioned a male offspring during their intimate conversations.

While little can be said with any great certainty about the inner workings of North Korea’s secretive regime and Kim Ju-ae’s ascent to a leadership role is far from assured, her growing public profile certainly makes it appear more plausible than it did just nine months ago.