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Southeast Asian ministers urge North Korea to rein in weapons programs

North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un looks on during a visit to the Chemical Material Institute of the Academy of Defense Science in this undated photo released by North Korea's Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) in Pyongyang on August 23, 2017. KCNA/via REUTERS

By Manuel Mogato

CLARK FREEPORT ZONE, Philippines (Reuters) – Southeast Asian defense ministers on Monday expressed “grave concern” over North Korea’s nuclear and missile programs and urged the reclusive country to meet its international obligations and resume communications.

North Korea is working to develop a nuclear-tipped missile capable of striking the U.S. mainland and has ignored all calls, even from its lone major ally, China, to rein in its weapons programs which it conducts in defiance of U.N. Security Council resolutions.

Defense ministers from the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), in a joint statement, underscored the “need to maintain peace and stability in the region” and called “for the exercise of self-restraint and the resumption of dialogue to de-escalate tensions in the Korean peninsula”.

They are due to meet with their counterparts from the United States, China, Japan, South Korea, India, Australia, Russia and New Zealand on Tuesday when North Korea, the disputed South China Sea and terrorism are expected to top the agenda.

U.S. Defense Secretary Jim Mattis has said he will talk with Asian allies about North Korea and the crisis caused by its “reckless” provocations.

Mattis’s trip to Asia, which will also include stops in Thailand and South Korea, comes just weeks before Donald Trump’s first visit to Asia as U.S. president.

In the same statement, the ministers reiterated the importance of “safety and freedom of navigation in and over-flight above the South China Sea” and called for “self restraint in the conduct of activities”.

They also vowed to work together to combat terrorism as they condemned the attack by the Maute militant group in the southern Philippine city of Marawi.

The Philippines on Monday announced the end of five months of military operations in Marawi after a fierce and unfamiliar urban war that marked the country’s biggest security crisis in years.

(Writing by Karen Lema; Editing by Nick Macfie)

Trump expected to pressure China’s Xi to rein in North Korea: officials

By Steve Holland

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. President Donald Trump is expected to pressure China’s president when they meet next month in Beijing to do more to rein in North Korea out of a belief that Xi Jinping’s consolidation of power should give him more authority to do so.

Trump leaves Nov. 3 on a trip that will take him to Japan, South Korea, China, Vietnam and the Philippines. It will be his first tour of Asia since taking power in January and one with a major priority: Preventing the standoff with North Korea from spiraling out of control.

Xi is immersed in a Communist Party Congress expected to culminate in him consolidating his control and potentially retaining power beyond 2022, when the next congress takes place.

Trump believes that Xi should have even more leverage to work on the North Korea problem.

“The president’s view is you have even less of an excuse now,” said one official. “He’s not going to step lightly.”

Trump wants to gain some serious cooperation from China to persuade Pyongyang to either change its mind or help deprive it of so much resources that it has no choice but to alter its behavior, the official said.

Trump has heaped praise on Xi in recent weeks in hopes of gaining Chinese cooperation and has held back from major punitive trade measures.

In an interview with Fox Business Network’s Maria Bartiromo, Trump said he wants to “keep things very, very low key” with Xi until the Chinese leader emerges from the party congress.

“I believe he’s got the power to do something very significant with respect to North Korea. We’ll see what happens. Now with that being said, we’re prepared for anything. We are so prepared, like you wouldn’t believe,” Trump said in the interview, to air on Sunday.

Trump has traded bitter insults with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, using his speech at the United Nations General Assembly last month to dismiss Kim as a “rocket man” on a suicide mission for his repeated nuclear tests and ballistic missile launches. He said if threatened, the United States would “totally destroy” North Korea.

Kim in recent weeks said the United States would face an “unimaginable strike” from North Korea if provoked.

CIA chief Mike Pompeo said on Thursday that North Korea could be only “months” away from gaining the ability to hit the United States with nuclear weapons.

(Additional reporting by David Brunnstrom; Editing by James Dalgleish)

U.S. carrier patrols off Korean peninsula in warning to Pyongyang

By Tim Kelly

ABOARD USS RONALD REAGAN, Sea of Japan (Reuters) – The USS Ronald Reagan, a 100,000-ton nuclear powered aircraft carrier, patrolled in waters east of the Korean peninsula on Thursday, in a show of sea and air power designed to warn off North Korea from any military action.

The U.S. Navy’s biggest warship in Asia, with a crew of 5,000 sailors, sailed around 100 miles (160.93 km), launching almost 90 F-18 Super Hornet sorties from its deck, in sight of South Korean islands.

It is conducting drills with the South Korean navy involving 40 warships deployed in a line stretching from the Yellow Sea west of the peninsula into the Sea of Japan.

“The dangerous and aggressive behavior by North Korea concerns everybody in the world,” Rear Admiral Marc Dalton, commander of the Reagan’s strike group, said in the carrier’s hangar as war planes taxied on the flight deck above.

“We have made it clear with this exercise, and many others, that we are ready to defend the Republic of Korea.”

The Reagan’s presence in the region, coupled with recent military pressure by Washington on Pyongyang, including B1-B strategic bomber flights over the Korean peninsula, comes ahead of President Donald Trump’s first official visit to Asia, set to start in Japan on Nov. 5, with South Korea to follow.

North Korea has slammed the warship gathering as a “rehearsal for war”. It comes as senior Japanese, South Korean and U.S. diplomats meet in Seoul to discuss a diplomatic way forward backed up by U.N. sanctions.

The U.N. Security Council has unanimously ratcheted up sanctions on North Korea over its nuclear and ballistic missile programmes since 2006. The most stringent include a ban on coal, iron ore and seafood exports that aim at halting a third of North Korea’s $3 billion of annual exports.

On Monday, Kim In Ryong, North Korea’s deputy U.N. envoy, told a U.N. General Assembly committee the Korean peninsula situation had reached a touch-and-go point and a nuclear war could break out at any moment.

A series of weapons tests by Pyongyang, including its sixth and most powerful nuclear test on Sept. 3 and two missile launches over Japan, has stoked tension in East Asia.

A Russian who returned from a visit to Pyongyang has said the regime is preparing to test a missile it believes can reach the U.S. west coast.

On Sunday, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said President Donald Trump had instructed him to continue diplomatic efforts to defuse tension with North Korea.

Washington has not ruled out the eventual possibility of direct talks with the North to resolve the stand-off, U.S. Deputy Secretary of State John J. Sullivan said on Tuesday.

(Reporting by Tim Kelly; Editing by Clarence Fernandez)

North Korea warns states: Don’t join any U.S. action and you’re safe

UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) – North Korea warned countries at the United Nations on Monday in a statement: don’t join the United States in military action against the Asian state and you will be safe from retaliation.

The caution was contained in a copy of North Korean Deputy U.N. Ambassador Kim In Ryong’s prepared remarks for a discussion on nuclear weapons by a U.N. General Assembly committee. However, Kim did not read that section out loud.

“As long as one does not take part in the U.S. military actions against the DPRK (North Korea), we have no intention to use or threaten to use nuclear weapons against any other country,” according to Kim’s prepared remarks.

“The entire U.S. mainland is within our firing range and if the U.S. dares to invade our sacred territory even an inch it will not escape our severe punishment in any part of the globe,” the statement read.

Tensions have soared between the United States and North Korea following a series of weapons tests by Pyongyang and a string of increasingly bellicose exchanges between U.S. President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.

The U.N. Security Council has unanimously ratcheted up sanctions on North Korea over its nuclear and ballistic missile programs since 2006.

North Korean Deputy U.N. Ambassador Kim did tell the U.N. General Assembly committee on Monday: “Unless the hostile policy and the nuclear threat of the U.S. is thoroughly eradicated, we will never put our nuclear weapons and ballistic rockets on the negotiation table under any circumstance.”

(Reporting by Michelle Nichols; Editing by James Dalgleish)

EU to ban business ties with Pyongyang over nuclear tests

North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un inspects the January 18 General Machine Plant in Pyongyang, North Korea in this undated photo released by North Korea's Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) on August 10, 2016. KCNA/via REUTERS ATTENTION EDITORS - THIS PICTURE WAS PROVIDED BY A THIRD PARTY. NO THIRD PARTY SALES. SOUTH KOREA OUT. NO COMMERCIAL OR EDITORIAL SALES IN SOUTH KOREA.

By Robin Emmott

BRUSSELS (Reuters) – The European Union is set to agree on Monday to ban business ties with North Korea, part of a new package of sanctions to isolate Pyongyang over its nuclear and missile programs.

The practical impact of the moves is likely to be mostly symbolic: Brussels will impose an oil embargo and a ban on EU investment, but it sells no crude to North Korea and European companies have no substantial investments there.

North Korean workers in the EU, of which Brussels estimates there are about 400 mainly in Poland, will face a lower limit on the amount for money they can send home and their work visas will not be renewed once they expire.

The measures to be agreed by EU foreign ministers in Luxembourg go further than the latest round of multi-lateral sanctions imposed by the United Nations Security Council.

“The North Koreans appear to be uninterested in having the EU get involved as a peace mediator,” said an EU diplomat. “The North Koreans want direct talks with the United States, but President (Donald) Trump has ruled that out,” the diplomat said.

The sanctions will add three more top North Korean officials and six businesses to a blacklist banning them from travel to the EU and freezing their assets. That will take the total of those sanctioned by the EU to 41 individuals and 10 companies, a senior EU official said. Separately, U.N. sanctions target 63 people and 53 companies and institutions.

“We have in place everything that we possibly could do to try to get the DPRK to change their behavior,” the EU official said, using North Korea’s official name of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.

Although the EU does not export crude to North Korea, its aim is to push other countries to ban oil exports, either unilaterally or at the United Nations. The U.N. Security Council last month capped North Korean imports of crude oil, but China and Russia resisted an outright ban.

Diplomats said that if Pyongyang launches more missiles, the EU could consider imposing sanctions on non-EU firms doing business with Pyongyang, as the United States has done.

However, such “secondary sanctions” need clear evidence to avoid legal challenges and the bloc is reluctant to anger China, a top trading partner, by targeting Chinese people and firms.

(Reporting by Robin Emmott; editing by Peter Graff)

North Korea hackers stole South Korea-U.S. military plans to wipe out North Korea leadership: lawmaker

The North Korea flag flutters next to concertina wire at the North Korean embassy in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia March 9, 2017. REUTERS/Edgar Su

By Christine Kim

SEOUL (Reuters) – North Korean hackers stole a large amount of classified military documents, including South Korea-U.S. wartime operational plans to wipe out the North Korean leadership, a South Korean ruling party lawmaker said on Wednesday.

Democratic Party representative Rhee Cheol-hee said 235 gigabytes of military documents were taken from the Defense Integrated Data Center in September last year, citing information from unidentified South Korean defense officials.

An investigative team inside the defense ministry announced in May the hack had been carried out by North Korea, but did not disclose what kind of information had been taken.

Pyongyang has denied responsibility in its state media for the cyber attacks, criticizing Seoul for “fabricating” claims about online attacks.

Separately on Wednesday, cyber security firm FireEye said in a statement North Korea-affiliated agents were detected attempting to phish U.S. electric companies through emails sent in mid-September, although those attempts did not lead to a disruption in the power supply.

It did not specify when the attempts had been detected or clarify which companies had been affected.

Rhee, currently a member of the National Assembly’s committee for national defense, said about 80 percent of the hacked data had not yet been identified, but that none of the information was expected to have compromised the South Korean military because it was not top classified intelligence.

Some of the hacked data addressed how to identify movements of members of the North Korean leadership, how to seal off their hiding locations, and attack from the air before eliminating them.

Rhee said the North could not have taken the entire operation plans from the database because they had not been uploaded in full.

These plans had likely not been classified properly but defense ministry officials told Rhee the hacked documents were not of top importance, he said.

“Whatever the North Koreans took, we just need to fix the plans,” Rhee later told Reuters by telephone. “I disclosed this because the military hasn’t been doing that fast enough.”

SIMPLE MISTAKE

Rhee said on radio the hack had been made possible by “a simple mistake” after a connector jack linking the military’s intranet to the internet had not been eliminated after maintenance work had been done on the system.

The South Korean Defense Ministry’s official stance is that they cannot confirm anything the lawmaker said about the hacked content due to the sensitivity of the matter.

In Washington, the Pentagon said it was aware of the media reports but would not comment on the potential breach.

“Although I will not comment on intelligence matters or specific incidents related to cyber intrusion, I can assure you that we are confident in the security of our operations plans and our ability to deal with any threat from North Korea,” Pentagon spokesman Colonel Robert Manning told reporters.

FireEye said the phishing attack on the electric companies detected was “early-stage reconnaissance” and did not indicate North Korea was about to stage an “imminent, disruptive” cyber attack. The North has been suspected of carrying out similar cyber attacks on South Korean electric utilities, in addition to other government and financial institutions.

Those attempts were likely aimed at creating a means of “deterring potential war or sowing disorder during a time of armed conflict”, FireEye said.

“North Korea linked hackers are among the most prolific nation-state threats, targeting not only the U.S. and South Korea but the global financial system and nations worldwide,” its statement said.

“Their motivations vary from economic enrichment to traditional espionage to sabotage, but all share the hallmark of an ascendant cyber power willing to violate international norms with little regard for potential blowback,” it said.

(Reporting by Christine Kim in SEOUL and Ishita Chigilli Palli in Bengaluru; Additional reporting by Idrees Ali in Washington; Editing by James Dalgleish, Michael Perry and Paul Tait)

U.S. Navy carrier drills with Japanese navy amid North Korean tension

USS Ronald Reagan (rear), a Nimitz-class nuclear-powered supercarrier, sails side-by-side with Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force's Hyuga-class helicopter destroyer Ise (DDH-182) during their joint military drill in the sea off Japan, in this photo released taken by Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force on September 14, 2017 and released on September 22, 2017. Picture taken September 14, 2017. Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force/HANDOUT via REUTERS

TOKYO (Reuters) – The U.S. Navy carrier Ronald Reagan is conducting drills with Japanese warships in seas south of the Korean peninsula, Japan’s military said on Friday, in a show of naval power as Pyongyang threatens further nuclear and missile tests.

The Reagan strike group will conduct a separate drill with the South Korean Navy in October, the defense ministry said in a statement distributed to South Korean lawmakers on Monday.

The 100,000-ton Reagan, which is based in Japan, and its escort ships have been holding drills with Japanese navy vessels since Sept 11 in waters south and west of Japan’s main islands, the Japan Maritime Self Defence Force said in a statement.

That exercise with the three Japanese warships, including two destroyers and one of the country’s two biggest helicopter carriers, the Ise, will run until Sept 28, it added.

The U.S. and regional allies are responding with military drills, including bomber and jet fighter flights near the Korean peninsula, as Pyongyang pursues its nuclear and missile programs, with an apparent hydrogen bomb test and two ballistic missile firings over Japan in recent weeks.

North Korea on Friday said it might test a hydrogen bomb over the Pacific Ocean after U.S. President Donald Trump vowed to destroy the country.

(Reporting by Tim Kelly and Nobuhiro Kubo in TOKYO; Additional reporting by Christine Kim in SEOUL; Editing by Clarence Fernandez)

U.S. flies bombers over Korea as Trump discusses options

By Christine Kim and Eric Beech

SEOUL/WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The U.S. military flew two strategic bombers over the Korean peninsula in a show of force late on Tuesday, as President Donald Trump met top defense officials to discuss how to respond to any threat from North Korea.

Tensions have soared between the United States and North Korea following a series of weapons tests by Pyongyang and a string of increasingly bellicose exchanges between Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.

North Korea has launched two missiles over Japan and conducted its sixth nuclear test in recent weeks as it fast advances toward its goal of developing a nuclear-tipped missile capable of hitting the U.S. mainland.

The two U.S. Air Force B-1B bombers were joined by two F-15K fighters from the South Korean military after leaving their base in Guam, South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff said in a statement on Wednesday.

After entering South Korean airspace, the two bombers carried out air-to-ground missile drills in waters off the east coast of South Korea, then flew over the South to waters between it and China to repeat the drill, the release said.

The U.S. military said in a separate statement it conducted drills with Japanese fighters after the exercise with South Korea, making it the first time U.S. bombers have conducted training with fighters from both Japan and South Korea at night.

The U.S. bombers had taken off from the Andersen Air Force Base in Guam. In August, Pyongyang threatened to fire intermediate-range missiles toward the vicinity of Guam, a U.S. Pacific territory that is frequently subjected to sabre-rattling from the North.

GUARD RAISED

South Korean and U.S. government officials have been raising their guard against more North Korean provocations with the approach of the 72nd anniversary of the founding of North Korea’s ruling party, which fell on Tuesday.

Trump hosted a discussion on Tuesday on options to respond to any North Korean aggression or, if necessary, to prevent Pyongyang from threatening the United States and its allies with nuclear weapons, the White House said in a statement.

Trump was briefed by Secretary of Defense James Mattis and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Joseph Dunford at a national security team meeting, the statement said.

U.S. and South Korean wartime operational plans, including a plan to wipe out the North Korean leadership, were stolen by North Korean hackers last year, a South Korean ruling party lawmaker said on Wednesday.

Some 235 gigabytes of military documents were taken from South Korea’s Defense Integrated Data Center in September last year, Democratic Party representative Rhee Cheol-hee said in radio appearances on Wednesday, citing information from unidentified South Korean defense officials.

In May, an investigative team inside the defense ministry announced the hack had been carried out by North Korea, but did not disclose what kind of information had been taken.

SHIPS BANNED

The United Nations Security Council, which has imposed a series of ever tighter sanctions on North Korea, has banned four ships from ports globally for carrying coal from North Korea, including one vessel that also had ammunition.

The vessels are the first to be designated under stepped-up sanctions imposed on North Korea by the 15-member council in August and September over two long-range ballistic missile launches and Pyongyang’s sixth and largest nuclear test.

China, North Korea’s main ally and trading partner, has consistently argued sanctions alone will not work, urging Washington and Pyongyang to lower their rhetoric and return to the negotiating table.

China’s influential Global Times tabloid expressed alarm at how far the rhetoric on both sides had gone and how it had increased the risk of a “fatal misjudgment”.

“The international community won’t accept North Korea as a nuclear power. North Korea needs time and proof to believe that abandoning its nuclear program will contribute to its own political and economic advantage. This positive process is worth a try,” the paper said in an editorial late on Tuesday.

“War would be a nightmare for the Korean Peninsula and surrounding regions. We strongly urge North Korea and the U.S. to stop their bellicose posturing and seriously think about a peaceful solution,” it said.

(Reporting by Christine Kim and Eric Beech; Additional reporting by Soyoung Kim in SEOUL, John Rutwich in SHANGHAI, and Michelle Nichols at the UNITED NATIONS; Writing by Lincoln Feast; Editing by Michael Perry and Paul Tait)

Kim Jong Un praises nuclear program, promotes sister

By James Pearson

SEOUL (Reuters) – North Korea’s leader Kim Jong Un said his nuclear weapons were a “powerful deterrent” that guaranteed its sovereignty, state media reported on Sunday, hours after U.S. President Donald Trump said “only one thing will work” in dealing with the isolated country.

Trump did not make clear to what he was referring, but his comments seemed to be a further suggestion that military action was on his mind.

In a speech to a meeting of the powerful Central Committee of the ruling Workers’ Party on Saturday, a day before Trump’s most recent comments, state media said Kim had addressed the “complicated international situation”.

North Korea’s nuclear weapons are a “powerful deterrent firmly safeguarding the peace and security in the Korean peninsula and Northeast Asia,” Kim said, referring to the “protracted nuclear threats of the U.S. imperialists.”

In recent weeks, North Korea has launched two missiles over Japan and conducted its sixth nuclear test, and may be fast advancing toward its goal of developing a nuclear-tipped missile capable of hitting the U.S. mainland.

North Korea is preparing to test-launch such a missile, a Russian lawmaker who had just returned from a visit to Pyongyang was quoted as saying on Friday.

Donald Trump has previously said the United States would “totally destroy” North Korea if necessary to protect itself and its allies.

The situation proved that North Korea’s policy of “byungjin”, meaning the parallel development of nuclear weapons and the economy was “absolutely right”, Kim Jong Un said in the speech.

“The national economy has grown on their strength this year, despite the escalating sanctions,” said Kim, referring to U.N. Security Council resolutions put in place to curb Pyongyang’s nuclear and missile program.

SISTER PROMOTION

The meeting also handled some personnel changes inside North Korea’s secretive and opaque ruling center of power, state media said.

Kim Jong Un’s sister, Kim Yo Jong, was made an alternate member of the politburo – the top decision-making body over which Kim Jong Un presides.

Alongside Kim Jong Un himself, the promotion makes Kim Yo Jong the only other millennial member of the influential body.

Her new position indicates the 28-year-old has become a replacement for Kim Jong Un’s aunt, Kim Kyong Hui, who had been a key decision maker when former leader Kim Jong Il was alive.

“It shows that her portfolio and writ is far more substantive than previously believed and it is a further consolidation of the Kim family’s power,” said Michael Madden, a North Korea expert at Johns Hopkins University’s 38 North website.

In January, the U.S. Treasury blacklisted Kim Yo Jong along with other North Korean officials over “severe human rights abuses”.

Kim Jong Sik and Ri Pyong Chol, two of the three men behind Kim’s banned rocket program, were also promoted.

State media announced that several other high ranking cadres were promoted to the Central Committee in what the South Korean unification ministry said could be an attempt by North Korea to navigate a way through its increasing isolation.

“The large-scale personnel reshuffle reflects that Kim Jong Un is taking the current situation seriously, and that he’s looking for a breakthrough by promoting a new generation of politicians,” the ministry said in a statement.

North Korea’s foreign minister Ri Yong Ho, who named Donald Trump “President Evil” in a bombastic speech to the U.N. General Assembly last month, was promoted to full vote-carrying member of the politburo.

“Ri can now be safely identified as one of North Korea’s top policy makers,” said Madden.

“Even if he has informal or off the record meetings, Ri’s interlocutors can be assured that whatever proposals they proffer will be taken directly to the top,” he said.

(Additional reporting by Yuna Park in SEOUL; Editing by Christian Schmollinger and John Stonestreet)

North Korea’s ‘princess’ now one of the secretive state’s top policy makers

Kim Yo Jong, sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, attends an opening ceremony of a newly constructed residential complex in Ryomyong street in Pyongyang, North Korea

By Hyonhee Shin and Soyoung Kim

SEOUL (Reuters) – The promotion of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un’s 28-year-old sister to the country’s top decision-making body is a sign he is strengthening his position by drawing his most important people closer to the center of power, experts and officials say.

Kim Yo Jong was named as an alternate member of the politburo within the ruling Workers’ Party of Korea – the opaque, all-powerful party organ where top state affairs are decided, the North’s official media said on Sunday.

It makes her only the second woman in patriarchal North Korea to join the exclusive club after Kim Kyong Hui, who held powerful roles when her brother Kim Jong Il ruled the country.

“Since she is a female, Kim Jong Un likely does not see her as a threat and a challenge to his leadership,” said Moon Hong-sik, research fellow at the Institute for National Security Strategy. “As the saying goes ‘blood is thicker than water,’ Kim Jong Un thinks Kim Yo Jong can be trusted.”

Unlike her aunt, who was promoted to the politburo in 2012 after serving more than three decades in the party, Kim Yo Jong has risen to power at an unprecedented pace.

Kim Kyong Hui has not been seen since her husband, Jang Song Thaek, once regarded as the No.2 leader in Pyongyang, was executed in 2013. South Korea’s spy agency believes she is now in a secluded place near Pyongyang undergoing a treatment for an unidentified disease, according to an August briefing to parliament.

Jang and his wife are not the only relatives to fall from Kim Jong Un’s favor.

Kim Jong Un’s estranged half-brother, Kim Jong Nam, was killed with a toxic nerve agent at a Malaysian airport in February. Two women are on trial for the murder, which South Korean and U.S. officials believe Kim Jong Un’s regime was behind.

Kim Jong Nam, who lived in exile in Macau, had criticized his family’s dynastic rule and his brother had issued a standing order for his execution, according to some South Korean lawmakers.

IN A PONYTAIL AND BLACK SUITS

The smartly dressed Kim Yo Jong, her hair usually pulled back in a ponytail and mostly seen in black suits and black-heeled shoes, made her first debut on state media in December 2011, seen standing tearfully next to Kim Jong Un at the funeral of their father.

Since then, Kim has made several appearances with her brother, giggling at concerts, riding a white horse, smiling as she receives flowers on his behalf at state functions.

Her youth and bubbly personality seen in state media are in stark contrast to the usually glum generals and aging party cadres who follow Kim Jong Un on official duties.

Having previously only occasionally appeared in the background, the young heiress has moved to the front and center of media photos more recently, assisting her brother at numerous high-profile state events.

At a massive military parade in April to mark the 105th birth anniversary of founding father Kim Il Sung, she was seen rushing out from behind pillars to bring paperwork to her brother as he prepared to give an address.

The same month, she stood alongside him during the unveiling ceremony of a construction project in Pyongyang.

In March 2016, she accompanied Kim Jong Un to a field guidance for nuclear scientists, where he claimed successful miniaturisation of nuclear warheads.

“Kim Yo Jong’s official inclusion in the 30-strong exclusive club of North Korea’s chief policy makers means her role within the regime will be expanded further,” Cheong Seong-chang, senior fellow at the Sejong Institute south of Seoul.

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and his sister Kim Yo Jong attend an opening ceremony of a newly constructed residential complex in Ryomyong street in Pyongyang, North Korea

FILE PHOTO: North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and his sister Kim Yo Jong attend an opening ceremony of a newly constructed residential complex in Ryomyong street in Pyongyang, North Korea April 13, 2017. REUTERS/Damir Sagolj/File Photo

BEHIND THE VEIL

Apart from her age, little is known about Kim Yo Jong. She was publicly identified for the first time in February 2011 when a South Korean TV station caught her at a Eric Clapton concert in Singapore with her other brother, Kim Jong Chol.

The three, who all reportedly went to school in Switzerland, are full blood siblings, born to Kim Jong Il’s fourth partner, Ko Yong Hui.

Kim Jong Chol, the oldest of Kim Jong Il’s sons, does not involve himself in politics, leading a quiet life in Pyongyang where he plays guitar in a band, according to Thae Yong Ho, North Korea’s former deputy ambassador in London who defected to the South.

In 2014, Kim Yo Jong was made vice director of the Workers’ Party’s Propaganda and Agitation Department, which handles ideological messaging through the media, arts and culture.

The position led the U.S. Treasury Department to blacklist her along with six other North Korean officials in January for “severe human rights abuses” and censorship that concealed the regime’s “inhumane and oppressive behavior”.

Last year, South Korea’s former spy chief said Kim Yo Jong was seen “abusing power”, punishing propaganda department executives for “minor mistakes”.

In a North Korean state media photo in January 2015, she was spotted wearing a ring on her fourth finger during a visit to a child care center.

South Korean intelligence officials say Kim might have wed a schoolmate from the prestigious Kim Il Sung University, but there has been no confirmation of whether she is indeed married or to whom.

(Additional reporting by James Pearson and Haejin Choi in Seoul; Editing by Lincoln Feast)

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