North Korea Leader’s ‘Closest Comrade’ Killed in Crash: State Media

Choe Ryong Hae, North Korea’s Workers’ Party secretary, was included in a roster of top official names, made public during a North Korea announcement for the former Kim’s state funeral committee, Jiji Press reported.

But from 2010 (when Kim Jong Un was officially designated as Kim Jong Il’s successor and become more publicly active) through his death at the end of 2015, Kim Yang Gon accompanied the North Korean leader (Kim Jong Il until December 2011 and Kim Jong Un afterward) an average of 38.2 times per year.

North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un has expressed deep sorrow over the death of a top aide, displaying unusual intimacy towards his “close comrade-in-arms whom nobody can replace”.

Kim and Hwang Pyong So, the reclusive regime’s leader’s deputy and political director of North Korea’s army, attended high-level talks inside the Demilitarized Zone.

Kim Yang-Gon was the only North Korean official present at their meeting in Pyongyang.

The state news agency called him Kim Jong-un’s “closest comrade and a solid revolutionary partner”. “The one who appointed him head of the United Front Department was Kim Jong Il, the father of the current leader”.

Kim Yang Gon (73) was a familiar face for negotiators from South Korea who have haggled with the North for years over issues such as its pursuit of nuclear weapons and the two Koreas’ efforts to arrange temporary reunions of relatives separated by the Korean War six decades ago.

September 2006: Jang, the executed uncle of Kim, reportedly survived a auto accident, according to South Korean media reports.

A state funeral will be held for Mr Gon on Friday.

“He was North Korea’s point man on South Korea”, says Aidan Foster-Carter, honorary senior research fellow in sociology and modern Korea at Leeds University.

“Security is extremely tight when a high(-ranking) official is traveling through essentially empty streets”.

Reports of the deaths often come from the NIS, defectors or other sources rather than North Korean state media.

Kim Yang Gon was the Secretary of the Worker’s Party in North Korea.

North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un, the third-generation North Korean leader of the Kim family, has killed several senior officials, including family members, since becoming the country’s “supreme leader”.

Defence Minister Hyon Yong Chol was said to have been executed in April by anti-aircraft fire for dozing off during formal military rallies.