October 05, 2011 13:47
North Korean leader Kim Jong-il's grandson Han-sol identifies his religion as "Christian-other" on his MySpace profile page. The "Christian-other" category is normally used to refer to the Greek Orthodox Church, small Protestant denominations, or non-denominational Christians.
In his Facebook profile photo, Kim Han-sol wears a necklace with a pendant that looks like a crucifix. And on his YouTube channel, he identified himself as "Pro-Religious Rights." But when he subscribed to AsiaFind, an online dating site for Asians, in October last year, he introduced himself as an agnostic.
"Genuine religious freedom does not exist" in North Korea, the U.S. State Department says in its 2010 International Religious Freedom Report. "Members of underground churches were arrested, beaten, tortured, or killed because of their religious beliefs. An estimated 150,000 to 200,000 persons were believed to be held in political prison camps in remote areas, some for religious reasons."
Subscribing to www.lovelandia.com, an Australian website that shares love poems and quotes, Han-sol says he was born on June 16, 1994. This supports the belief that both the Internet IDs "khsol616" and "kimhs616" are combinations of his English initials and birthday. The 17-year-old boy gave his income as "more than US$250,000" on MySpace.
Other traces of his Internet activity have also been tracked down. He left a sarcastic message reading, "Long Live Free Democracy!!!!" under a video clip showing a chaotic candlelight vigil in Seoul on a video website.
On another video website, which introduces the North's "Arirang" mass calisthenics show as a new entry in the Guinness Book of Records, he said, "All performers were students. About 80,000 students performed it."
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