President Donald Trump is due to meet with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un on June 12 in Singapore, with Pyongyang’s nuclear arsenal high on the agenda. Late last month the North’s state media revealed that Kim Su Gil had been appointed director of the military’s powerful General Political Bureau (GPB), replacing Kim Jong Gak. Defence minister Pak Yong Sik has been succeeded by No Kwang Chol, previously first vice minister, it added. “The North appears to have brought in new figures… as the previous officials lacked flexibility in thinking,” the source said. “It’s meaningless to divide North Korean officials into hardliners and moderates,” said Kim Dong-yub, a professor at the Institute for Far Eastern Studies at Kyungnam University.

Source: The Guardian June 04, 2018 06:45 UTC