The powerful sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un has been promoted in the ruling party structure at the party congress, during which he set the country’s economic agenda for the next five years.
– The ruling Workers’ Party Central Committee named the North Korean leader’s sister, Kim Yo Jong – who was previously a deputy department director – as a full department director.
– Kim Yo Jong will likely be assigned to lead the propaganda department, whose role includes overseeing inter-Korean relations or external strategies.
– Thousands of party elites have packed the capital, Pyongyang, for the once-in-five-years Workers’ Party summit, a gathering that directs state efforts on everything from diplomacy to war planning.
– On Monday, members re-elected Kim Jong Un as the Workers’ Party’s secretary-general, extending his 15-year rule of the country’s sole governing party and solidifying his grip on power.
– Kim Yo Jong has long been among her brother’s closest lieutenants and one of the most influential women in the party.
– Born in the late 1980s, according to the South Korean government, she is one of three children to Kim’s father and predecessor, Kim Jong Il, and his third known partner, former dancer Ko Yong Hui.
– Kim Yo Jong was educated in Switzerland alongside her brother and rose rapidly up the ranks once he inherited power after their father’s death in 2011.
– In 2018, she visited South Korea for the PyeongChang Winter Olympic Games, during a period of inter-Korean rapprochement.
– The announcement of Kim Yo Jong’s promotion comes as her brother promised to solidify and develop North Korea’s economy over the next five years.
– Calling the next five years a “full-scale progress phase” in a speech on Monday, Kim Jong Un called for revolutionising thought, technology and culture so new projects will be well-managed