I’ve said this before and I’ll say it again…
Most rumors about Kim Jong-Un and the North Korean regime are garbage. The brutal dictatorship terrorizes its people and tightly controls information. Much more so than even Russian, which relies more on spreading disinformation, aware that it can’t keep actual information from getting out, or Communist China and its great firewall.
Rumors about Kim Jong-Un largely come from former regime figures who fled the country. Those figures maintain their relevance and try to destabilize the regime by spreading rumors, some of them outlandish. While a North Korean opposition should be supported, these rumors accomplish very little except feeding the media’s appetite for news.
No matter how dubious.
Two things to remember.
1. Kim Jong Un’s actual grip on power is limited. North Korea is controlled by an oligarchy dominated by the same family, but unlike his father, Kim Jong Un is largely a front man.
2. Nobody bothers to check these rumors before printing them no matter how often they’re discredited. Under the stopped clock principle they might finally prove to be right. And that would be great. But don’t pay too much attention to them.
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