Top Stories reported that eight of eleven interviewed defectors believe Kim Ju Ae will succeed North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, pointing to protocols used during her public appearances.
North Korea was established in nineteen forty-eight as an authoritarian dynasty. Kim Il Sung transferred power to Kim Jong Il in nineteen ninety-four, and Kim Jong Il transferred power to Kim Jong Un in twenty eleven. Kim Jong Un is forty-two years old today. Kim Jong Il was fifty-two during the first transition, while Kim Jong Un was twenty-seven during the second transition. The isolated nuclear-armed nation holds a population of twenty-six million people.
South Korea's spy agency named Kim Ju Ae as the likely heir. Tae Yongho, who defected to South Korea in twenty sixteen, told Top Stories that "During her visits to missile launch sites and factories, the way senior North Korean officials treat Kim Ju Ae involves protocols reserved for a successor, not the ones simply for a daughter of Kim Jong Un." Dennis Rodman previously revealed the identity during a twenty thirteen trip to Pyongyang.
Among the ruling bodies, the Workers' Party maintains that one of seventeen ruling party department directors is female. Kim Jeong-Ah resettled in South Korea in two thousand nine, and Choi Song-juk fled North Korea in twenty fifteen.
Kim Yumi defected three years ago, fleeing pandemic regulations and hereditary rule, and learned about the daughter in November twenty twenty-two. Kim Yumi told Top Stories, "My husband and I didn’t want our children to live under a fourth-generation dictatorship. As parents, we thought the best thing we could do for our children was to give them freedom."