Hyon Yong-chol, head of North Korea’s military, was supposedly cut to bits by blasts from an anti-aircraft gun last year. It is possible to believe almost anything about Kim Jong-un, North Korea’s erratic, unpredictable and little-known leader. Kim wants the world to make him whole inside, to make him feel better about himself. Related: Kim Jong-un hails nuclear success at North Korea party congressBut neither can such colourful accounts of life and death in modern North Korea be entirely discounted. And that, in a nutshell, is his and his country’s tragedy – and the genesis of the rapidly growing North Korean nuclear threat.

Source: The Guardian May 07, 2016 17:35 UTC