headscratcher4
4th September 2003, 03:17 PM
From Today's NY Times...what a shock!
September 4, 2003
Suspense Ends in North Korea: The 'Dear Leader' Is Re-elected
By JAMES BROOKE
OKYO, Sept. 3 — The election outcome was never in doubt, but when North Koreans heard "the happy news," housewives left their houses, children left their schools and workers left their jobs, all "dancing with bunches of flowers in their hands," according to the state news agency.
By a vote of 687 to 0, the Supreme People's Assembly of North Korea today re-elected the "Dear Leader," Kim Jong Il, to his most important post, chairman of the National Defense Commission. Mr. Kim has been North Korea's leader since 1994, when his father died. He ran unopposed, winning a new five-year term, "reflecting the unanimous will and desire of all the servicemen and the people," according to the Korean Central News Agency.
This morning, suspense built throughout the land after North Korean television and radio warned of a major announcement. In South Korea, the stock market dipped. Then North Korean television broadcast a military band and choir playing rousing patriotic songs.
Finally, a woman dressed in a traditional Korean-style dress announced the election results, using the most reverent form of speech. For wide swaths of North Korea without electric power, cars with loudspeakers drove through towns and villages bringing the "excited voices of announcers conveying the news of the great event, and songs eulogizing Kim Jong Il's exploits."
In a country known for dour visages, this news set off widespread joy, the official news agency reported.
"The entire Korean people, including servicemen, old men and women, and children are coming out of their houses and working sites and dancing with bunches of flowers in their hands," the agency reported. North Korea is usually closed to foreign reporters.
Television showed scenes from Pyongyang, the capital, of women in colorful dress and children with red scarves singing songs and dancing in streets festooned with flags, flowers and banners. At a rally, uniformed soldiers, standing in neat rows, shouted slogans in response to a speaker who called for "battle readiness against the American imperialists."
At the Supreme People's Assembly, this mix of Stalinist choreography and personality cult reached its climax as all members jumped to their feet, cheering and clapping wildly, as Mr. Kim, standing on a raised platform, nodded slightly. The entire Assembly "broke into stormy cheers of `Hurrah!,' overwhelmed with unbounded emotion, jubilation and ardent reverence."
Mr. Kim, a pudgy, bespectacled 61-year-old, is not known to have ever given a publicly broadcast speech. A skillful backroom operator, he gradually won control of North Korea's military and governing party, starting in the 1970's. His rise to leadership at the death of his father, Kim Il Sung, was the first case of hereditary succession in the Communist world.
Last year, President Bush labeled North Korea, Iraq and Iran "the axis of evil." Since then Mr. Kim, evidently fearing an American assassination attempt, has kept an extremely low profile. In March, he failed to inaugurate the last session of the People's Assembly. In July, the authorities in Pyongyang abruptly canceled a vast military parade that he was to review, marking the 50th anniversary of the July 27, 1953, armistice that ended the Korean War. In August, he skipped the kind of public and predictable vacation he had taken in the last two summers, a leisurely train ride into Russia.
But today, he evidently felt the need to appear in public for his own re-election. With the world's fifth-largest military, 1.1 million soldiers, North Korea reserves its highest post for the chairman of the National Defense Commission. Kim Il Sung, dead for almost a decade, remains head of state.
September 4, 2003
Suspense Ends in North Korea: The 'Dear Leader' Is Re-elected
By JAMES BROOKE
OKYO, Sept. 3 — The election outcome was never in doubt, but when North Koreans heard "the happy news," housewives left their houses, children left their schools and workers left their jobs, all "dancing with bunches of flowers in their hands," according to the state news agency.
By a vote of 687 to 0, the Supreme People's Assembly of North Korea today re-elected the "Dear Leader," Kim Jong Il, to his most important post, chairman of the National Defense Commission. Mr. Kim has been North Korea's leader since 1994, when his father died. He ran unopposed, winning a new five-year term, "reflecting the unanimous will and desire of all the servicemen and the people," according to the Korean Central News Agency.
This morning, suspense built throughout the land after North Korean television and radio warned of a major announcement. In South Korea, the stock market dipped. Then North Korean television broadcast a military band and choir playing rousing patriotic songs.
Finally, a woman dressed in a traditional Korean-style dress announced the election results, using the most reverent form of speech. For wide swaths of North Korea without electric power, cars with loudspeakers drove through towns and villages bringing the "excited voices of announcers conveying the news of the great event, and songs eulogizing Kim Jong Il's exploits."
In a country known for dour visages, this news set off widespread joy, the official news agency reported.
"The entire Korean people, including servicemen, old men and women, and children are coming out of their houses and working sites and dancing with bunches of flowers in their hands," the agency reported. North Korea is usually closed to foreign reporters.
Television showed scenes from Pyongyang, the capital, of women in colorful dress and children with red scarves singing songs and dancing in streets festooned with flags, flowers and banners. At a rally, uniformed soldiers, standing in neat rows, shouted slogans in response to a speaker who called for "battle readiness against the American imperialists."
At the Supreme People's Assembly, this mix of Stalinist choreography and personality cult reached its climax as all members jumped to their feet, cheering and clapping wildly, as Mr. Kim, standing on a raised platform, nodded slightly. The entire Assembly "broke into stormy cheers of `Hurrah!,' overwhelmed with unbounded emotion, jubilation and ardent reverence."
Mr. Kim, a pudgy, bespectacled 61-year-old, is not known to have ever given a publicly broadcast speech. A skillful backroom operator, he gradually won control of North Korea's military and governing party, starting in the 1970's. His rise to leadership at the death of his father, Kim Il Sung, was the first case of hereditary succession in the Communist world.
Last year, President Bush labeled North Korea, Iraq and Iran "the axis of evil." Since then Mr. Kim, evidently fearing an American assassination attempt, has kept an extremely low profile. In March, he failed to inaugurate the last session of the People's Assembly. In July, the authorities in Pyongyang abruptly canceled a vast military parade that he was to review, marking the 50th anniversary of the July 27, 1953, armistice that ended the Korean War. In August, he skipped the kind of public and predictable vacation he had taken in the last two summers, a leisurely train ride into Russia.
But today, he evidently felt the need to appear in public for his own re-election. With the world's fifth-largest military, 1.1 million soldiers, North Korea reserves its highest post for the chairman of the National Defense Commission. Kim Il Sung, dead for almost a decade, remains head of state.