N.Korea Eases Ancestral Leader Worship

The North Korean regime seems to be gradually shifting the personality cult to current leader Kim Jong-un while his father and grandfather are fading from propaganda.

At the newly built Sunan International Airport in Pyongyang there are no portraits of regime founder Kim Il-sung, and footage of the Moranbong band that entertains the regime's bigwigs includes no images of Kim Il-sung or his son Kim Jong-il.

Unification Ministry spokesman Jeong Joon-hee here told reporters Monday that background footage of Kim Il-sung and Kim Jong-il was still played during the Moranbong band's performances in 2012 and 2013. But during an event on April 30 this year the band sang no songs of praise about them.

Instead, the background footage only showed Kim Jong-un.

"Kim Jong-un has often been seen in public without a badge showing Kim Il-sung and Kim Jong-il," a researcher at a government-funded think tank here said. "It seems that his younger sister Yo-jong, who runs the Workers Party's propaganda department, is seeking a change in the personality cult policy."

Meanwhile, Pyongyang on Monday agreed to receive North Korean sailors who were rescued by the South Korean Coast Guard while adrift in the East Sea. They will be handed over in the border truce village of Panmunjom.

Five sailors were rescued but three want to defect. The North has demanded that all five sailors are handed over and said it will bring the families of all of them.

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