Mick Hartley

Keeping the focus, for the moment, on North Korea, here's a date for your diary:

The Workers’ Party has handed down a decree ordering the people to commemorate Kim Jong Eun’s birthday on January 8th, according to North Korea Intellectuals Solidarity (NKIS), a defector organization based in Seoul.

NKIS cited a source inside North Korea as saying, “Conferences for Party cadres above the level of secretary of Primary Party Committees were held on January 2nd. In the conferences, the decree, ‘Regarding commemorating meaningfully the birthday of comrade Kim Jong Eun,’ was delivered.”

According to the decree, Kim Jong Eun’s birthday is to be publicized as January 8th and the entire Party apparatus, army and people should celebrate on that day. Interestingly, it also made clear, “January 8th is designated the birthday of Captain Kim Jong Eun, who is the other leader of us and our future, inheriting the perfect and pure blood of Mt. Baekdu.”

The decree ordered, “All enterprises and organizations must express their loyalty for Kim Jong Eun through loyalty singing performances and rallies on the day.”

A loyalty rally is supposed to consist of people swearing an oath of loyalty forwarded by the Party to each organizational level. In the loyalty singing performance, people have to sing “Footsteps,” a song praising Kim Jong Eun, according to the decree.

The NKIS interprets this decree and resultant birthday events as the opening publicity for the fact that Kim Jong Eun is the successor to Kim Jong Il, and that the North has therefore started moving forward with the succession.

The last information we had on Kim Jong Eun – aka Kim Jung Un – was that he's to be known as Brilliant Comrade. For more on the "perfect and pure blood of Mt. Baekdu", see here.

Just as soon as I find a performance of "Footsteps" on YouTube, you can be sure I'll be posting it. Is this the song, I wonder? I'd give a lot to see that being performed at the Namhung Youth Chemical Complex.