N.Korean leader's son working as lawmaker: reports

Aides to the youngest son and heir apparent of North Korean leader Kim Jong-Il planned an attack last year on Kim's oldest son but were warned off by China, a report said Wednesday.South Korea's Chosun Ilbo newspaper, citing a government source, said close aides of youngest son Jong-Un plotted an attack on Kim Jong-Nam after the leader had picked Jong-Un as heir apparent in January 2009.Jong-Nam has been living mainly in Beijing and the Chinese territory of Macau since falling out of favour with his father.

PYONGYANG, North Korea — North Korea lashed out anew Tuesday at South Korea over a small public protest in Seoul in which demonstrators burned effigies of the North’s leaders, saying it would not hold talks with its southern neighbor unless it apologized for anti-North Korean actions “big and small” and warning that it could take retaliatory measures at any time.

CLICK TO ENLARGE SEOUL, South Korea — After weeks of warlike rhetoric, North Kore

A North Korean embassy in Eastern Europe received a large batch of illegal drugs from the North Korean government last year, according to reports in South Korean press.

A huge network of secret slush funds owned by North Korean leader Kim Jong-un have been discovered during a joint US-South Korea investigation, Seoul-based newspaper Chosun Ilbo reports.

North Korean leader Kim Jong-Il has won support from key ally China for a second father-to-son succession, South Korea's spy chief was reported Tuesday as saying.National Intelligence Service (NIS) director Won Sei-Hoon, quoted by Chosun Ilbo newspaper, also said Kim might have taken his heir apparent and youngest son Jong-Un on his secretive trip to China late last month.Won was addressing a closed session of parliament's intelligence committee on Monday. The newspaper was quoting lawmakers at the meeting.Yonhap news agency carried a similar report.

Yves here. Since I don’t follow the military beat closely (I can do only so many things in a day, plus the runup to the Iraq war and quite a few of our recent Mideast interventions shows you can’t rely on mainstream media reports when US interests are at stake), I can’t judge the accuracy of this assessment. But it certainly is plausible.