SEOUL — Late North Korean leader Kim Jong-il kept the world guessing in death as in life, with state media keeping quiet about the timing and details of his funeral Wednesday.
Kim, who led the nation with an iron fist following his father Kim Il-sung’s death in 1994, died of a heart attack Dec. 17 at age 69, according to state media. He is to be succeeded by his young son Kim Jong-un, already being hailed as the “supreme leader” of the party, state and army.
After 11 days of mourning, a funeral was set for Wednesday and a memorial service for Thursday. Foreign news agencies based in Pyongyang, including Russia’s ITAR-Tass and China’s Xinhua new agencies, reported late Wednesday morning that a funeral had begun.
North Korea’s sole TV station, however, was showing only taped footage of sobbing mourners filing past Kim’s begonia-bedecked bier, a military orchestra playing odes to Kim and archive footage of Kim making “on-the-spot” field trips.
At noon, a broadcaster in a dark suit gravely read out a news dispatch about Kim Jong-un visiting his father’s bier on Tuesday with top party and military officials. He noted that Kim Jong-il’s body had been lying in state in Kumsusan Memorial Palace, suggesting the body was moved.
A private ceremony attended by Kim Jong-un and top party and military officials was expected to be held in an inner sanctum of Kumsusan. Foreign dignitaries were asked to gather at a sports stadium shortly before noon to be taken to Kumsusan to see the hearse pass at the start of a funeral procession through Pyongyang, according to a diplomat contacted in Pyongyang on Wednesday.
Heavy snow was falling in Pyongyang, which state media characterized in the early days of mourning as proof that the skies were “grieving” for Kim as well.
There was no sign yet of his son. Footage showed him dressed in nearly the same somber blue suit that his father wore in 1994 during the mourning for late President Kim Il-sung.
The young Kim made his public debut just last year with a promotion to four-star general and an appointment as vice chairman of the Central Military Commission of the Workers’ Party.
But in the days since his father’s death, the campaign to install him as the next leader has been swift, with state media bestowing him with new titles, including “great successor,” ’’supreme leader” and “sagacious leader.”
Even as they mourned his father with dramatic displays of grief at memorials and at Kumsusan, they have pledged their loyalty to his son.
In an essay paying homage to Kim Jong-il on Wednesday, the Rodong Sinmun said North Korea under his leadership had been “dignified as a country that manufactured and launched artificial satellites and accessed nukes,” referring to the country’s nuclear program.
“Thanks to these legacies, we do not worry about the destiny of ourselves and posterity at this time of national mourning,” the English-language essay said.
North Korea, it said, will be left in the “warm care” of Kim Jong-un.
“Supreme leader of our party and people Kim Jong-un takes warm care of the people left by Kim Jong-il. Every moment of Kim Jong-un’s life is replete with loving care and solicitude for the people,” the essay said.
Few details about the funeral were made public but the ceremonies are expected to follow the tradition set in 1994 with Kim Il-sung’s death.
In July 1994, the funeral began with a private ceremony attended by Kim Jong-il and top officials before a long procession through Pyongyang to Kim Il-sung Square, the main plaza in the capital, where hundreds of thousands of mourners were waiting.
North Koreans lined the streets and filled the air with theatrical wails, many of the women in traditional black dresses and with white mourning ribbons affixed to their hair.
A similar procession may be in the works for Wednesday, but with Kim’s namesake red “kimjongilia” begonias replacing the magnolias for Kim Il-sung, and snow and frost as a backdrop rather than sun and greenery.
At the time, details about the funeral in a country largely isolated from the West were shrouded in mystery, revealed only after state TV aired segments of the events in what was the world’s best glimpse of the hidden nation. Most foreigners aside from those living in North Korea were shut out, and the same is expected this week.
Kim Jong-il celebrated major occasions with lavish, meticulously choreographed parades designed to show off the nation’s military might, such as the October 2010 display when he introduced his son to the world, and a strong military presence was expected.
“A display of weapons may also be a way to demonstrate that the military remains loyal to the succession process,” said Ahn Chan-il of the World Institute for North Korea Studies in South Korea. “There may even be a small-scale military parade involving airplanes.”
In the Chinese border city of Dandong, across the Yalu River from North Korea, dozens of people crowded into North Korea’s consular offices in a high-rise building and into a North Korean restaurant across the street hoping to watch the funeral on television.
Many were dressed in black and among them were North Koreans, identifiable by the Kim Il-sung badges on their lapels. Police shooed reporters away from both venues, keeping them behind cordons.
Associated Press writers Hyung-jin Kim in Seoul, South Korea, and Eugene Hoshiko in Dandong, China, contributed to this report.
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