Previously, South Korea’s intelligence agency announced that Kim Jong Un is believed to have three children, but there was uncertainty about their birth order.
Read more The court sentenced the pickpocket to a suspended prison term
Kim Jong Un’s daughter Kim Ju Ae was publicly introduced for the first time in 2022 when she accompanied her father to an intercontinental ballistic missile test.
The Kim family has ruled North Korea for several decades, and the personality cult associated with their “Paektu bloodline” dominates the daily life of this diplomatically isolated country.
“The National Intelligence Service (NIS) currently believes that Kim Ju Ae is being prepared as a successor and knows that she has a younger brother or sister,” the agency said in a statement.
The NIS added that it continues efforts to definitively determine whether Kim Ju Ae has an older brother, but believes that “even if he exists, he is not suitable to become a successor.”
Since 2022, Kim Ju Ae has participated in several important political events with the North Korean leader, including a highly publicized visit to Beijing.
Read more Judge Virgilijus Grabinskas is finishing his work at the Supreme Court of Lithuania
North Korean state media also call her the “beloved child” and the “great guide” – in Korean “hyangdo” – a term usually reserved for the highest leaders and their successors.
Whether she has an older brother is one of the most important questions in foreign discussions about possible North Korean succession plans due to the deeply rooted patriarchy and male-dominated power system in the country. Since the country’s founding in 1948, all three North Korean leaders have been men from the Kim family.
The age or even gender of the children may be secondary compared to their potential as the father’s successors, South Korean Kyungnam University professor Lim Eul-chul told the news agency AFP.
“We can assume that he assessed that Ju Ae has the greatest potential to become his successor,” he added.
Read more Seven-year imprisonment sentence for the organizer of VAT fraud and money laundering
