Emerging Matriarchy in North Korea's Future?
Breaking: South Korea's National Assembly Speaker Woo Won-shik exchanged greetings with Kim Jong Un this morning before China's military parade, according to his office, as per Yonhap News. A rare moment of direct South-North contact in years. https://t.co/440HXkSjvc
— Raphael Rashid (@koryodynasty) September 3, 2025
Understand the encounter between Kim and South Korean Speaker Woo was perfunctory and very brief.
Revealing 25 second video below because it's the first I've seen showing that Kim Jong-eun's sister Kim Yeo-jong, was present during the audience with Xi. Also shown I believe, is Central Committee member, singer, and cultural director, Hyun Song wol, rumored to be a former romantic interest of Kim. On an earlier video showing the arrival of Kim's train in Beijing, I saw Choe Son-hui, the minister of foreign affairs, in the background remaining in the train car. These three women are the most powerful in North Korea, and I believe have more influence on Kim personally than others, because they have his confidence.
China's Xi and North Korea's Kim hold talks in Beijing
BEIJING, Sept 4 (Reuters) - Chinese President Xi Jinping and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un met on Thursday in Beijing, China's state broadcaster CCTV said.
The meeting would cover bilateral ties and issues of mutual concern and "hold significant importance", the Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson Guo Jiakun had told reporters at a regular briefing earlier in the day.
"China stands ready to strengthen strategic communication and enhance exchanges and cooperation with the DPRK, deepen the sharing of governance experience, and advance the respective socialist causes and the traditional friendly cooperative relations between China and the DPRK," Guo said.
The talks come after a military parade in Beijing on Wednesday which Kim had attended, along with Russian President Vladimir Putin. Both were seen walking and talking with Xi during the massive event which China used as a portrayal of force.
The pictures under this Reuters headline below are worth a look: In the KCNA photos, Foreign Minister Choe Son-hui, Kim's principal advisor on Foreign Affairs (imo) stands in the white jacket directly behind Kim Jong-eun's daughter, Ju Ae.
'Front runner' to be North Korea's next supreme leader makes international debut in China
SEOUL, Sept 3 (Reuters) - North Korean leader Kim Jong Un brought his teenage daughter to Beijing this week in her first public outing overseas, fueling further speculation that she may be his potential successor in the family's dynastic rule over the nuclear-armed state.
Secretive North Korea has never revealed her name or age, but South Korean intelligence officials believe she is the daughter identified as Ju Ae by former American basketball player Dennis Rodman. Rodman spent time with Kim's family in 2013 and described holding her as a baby.
South Korea's intelligence agency considers Ju Ae to be the most likely successor so far, despite questions over whether she can ultimately rise to the top of the male-dominated dynasty.
Estimated to be about 13 years old, Ju Ae has attended increasingly high-profile events, including her diplomatic debut at a Russian Embassy event in May.
This is from a post I made several years ago on the North Korean ladies close to Kim:
(Source- Channel A News Top Ten, 4.12.2019) Left to right: Ri Sol Ju, Kim's wife; Kim Yeo Jong, Kim's sister; Hyun Song Wol, entertainer, cultural director, and Kim confidante; and Choe Son-hui, Kim's newly (in 2019) elevated foreign affairs representative on the State Affairs Committee after Hanoi.
Kim's sister was elevated to the State Affairs Committee in 2021. Thae Yong-ho, a high level North Korean diplomatic defector to South Korea, once described Choe in Vladivostok with Putin in 2019 as Kim Jong-un's "windpipe," in other words, the source of life sustaining air from a powerful ally, Russia. The status of any other children Chairman Kim may have is unknown.
On the other hand, the influence of these women may only be as long lived as Kim himself. I'm guessing they would have to find sponsors in the security sector, military, and party. Kim's sister, daughter or whoever the sacred blood line successor might be, could turn out to be a figurehead, used by military and/or party members with forces more powerful than the Kim mythology itself, to effect a kind of regency, with an ineffectual heir presumptive on the throne. One is reminded of Kim's elimination of Chang Song-thaek as he consolidated his power in 2013. Would powerful male leaders in the bureaucracy consolidate behind one or more of these women and Kim's daughter? Without the Kim mythology what claim would any other pretender to power have? Just install a powerful dictatorship and eliminate the carefully constructed claim by three generations of Kim family to legitimacy?
Comments
NYTimes A Failed Top Secret Mission in North Korea in 2019
The report is behind a paywall.
I should have mentioned that Kim does have an older brother believed to still be in North Korea. Allegedly, Kim's half brother Kim Jang-nam was assassinated in Kuala Lumpur in 2017 after suspected unsuccessful approaches by the CIA. Initially western media reported North Korea was behind the assassination, but authorities there could not make a case against North Korea or any of its agents. The assassination was carried by other foreign nationals, two women, who both eventually walked, after a sweetheart deal, with the prosecution. Kim Jang-nam's son, Kim Han Sol, is the titular head of a regime change operation called Free Chosun and is now believed to be under FBI protection in the US.
What happened to Adrian Hong, and Christopher Ahn who attacked the DPRK embassy in Madrid, five days before the US-North Korea summit in Hanoi? Adrian Hong, who went under the moniker Oswaldo, and Ahn a former US marine subject to extradition to Spain have fallen off the radar. According to latest available media reports, Hong is a fugitive. Ahn was never extradited as far as I know. One report over a year old said Ahn was in an FBI witness protection program.
There were other CIA operations before the summits with North Korea, the apparent object being to derail any successful negotiations with North Korea. One earlier notable operation was "Free Chosun" aka Choellima Civil Defense, ostensibly a North Korean regime change operation.
These operations were intended to derail the negotiations with North Korea. Other reports said Ahn was involved in the rescue of Kim Han-sol.
語必忠信 行必正直
Tim S. addressed the 2019 "special mission" to NK
He also speculates that the mission may have been an unsuccessful decapitation mission by US Special Forces. One thing William Arkin said in his reporting on covert Special Forces missions, is that they are not subject to Congressional oversight. I don't know for sure.
語必忠信 行必正直