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WASHINGTON -- Recently, all sorts of rumors have been circulating about the North Korean system of National Defense Committee Chairman Kim Jong-il.
In Washington political circles, there have been rumors over the last 2 or 3 days that a coup had taken place in North Korea, and that anti-state groups had been distributing leaflets within North Korea, criticizing later leader Kim Il-sung and his son, Kim Jong-il. Ahead of this, the Internet edition of the New York Times reported on Nov. 8 that North Korean residents and military leaders had been launching continuous revolts against the Kim Jong-il dictatorship.
Despite these rumors, Kim appeared quite alive and well in North Korea's state-run media. Central TV and others reported Thursday that Kim, who had disappeared for half a month following his visit to Unit 756 on Nov. 2, had inspected Unit 754 along with military aides like Gen. Lee Myong-su.
About the coup rumors, an aide to an important U.S. Senator said Wednesday, "I heard talk of a coup yesterdayˇ¦ I called a number of places, and there were people who had heard rumors of a coup." He said, however, that he had not heard the source of or grounds for the rumor.
One Washington expert on Korea said he had heard rumors of a coup four days ago, and had asked a person in the Chinese border town of Dandong to find out what was going on. That person, however, could not detect any unusual signs, he said.
About this, U.S. State Department spokesperson Adam Ereli said his department did not have any opinion on the coup rumors worth sharing with the media or public.
Meanwhile, Japan's Sankei Shimbun reported Thursday that an anti-state group in North Korea had printed a leaflet severely criticizing the country's "dictatorship of the Juche ideology" on Oct. 10, the foundation day of the Korean Workers' Party, and distributed them in 50 places, including Pyongyang, Nampo, Sinuiju, Chongjin and Hamheung.
The Sankei said it received an actual copy of the leafet from Kim Dok-hong, the former head of Yogwang General Trading Company who defected to South Korea along with former Korean Workers Party secretary Hwang Jang-yop in 1997, and said it contained taboo material concerning the family history of Kim Il-sung and Kim Jong-il and criticism of the Juche ideology.
(Heo Yong-beom, heo@chosun.com )
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