The unprecedented visit by three top North Korean officials on October 4th to attend the closing
ceremony of the 2014 Incheon Asian Games was so unexpected that one source
reported he assumed the reason was to send condolences, similar to the visit by
two top officials sent to pay the North’s respects after the death of Kim Dae
Jung in 2009.
“There hasn’t been anything about the delegation’s visit
[since its return] in the state newspaper or broadcasts,” a source in North
Hamgyung Province reported on Wednesday. “I heard about it while drinking with
some Party cadres.”
Chosun Central News Agency [KCNA] reported only briefly at
9a.m. on October 4th, “Hwang Pyong So, director of the Korean People’s Army
general political department and vice-chair of the National Defence Commission
has departed Pyongyang by plane,” and, “He is accompanied by Choe Ryong Hae and
Kim Yang Gon.”
“The dispatch of such a high-ranking delegation was
something nobody could predict, so Party cadres are quite baffled by it as
well,” he said. “It was said the director of the General Political Department
of the Chosun People’s Army [KPA] went, and I thought that there was a big
accident in the South so they went to pay condolences like Kim Ki Nam [and Kim
Yang Gon during the 2009 visit after the death of Kim Dae Jung], and then I
finally found out that the real reason was for a sports competition.”
The source contends that the trip was not a productive one,
“I don’t know if the story is that Hwang Pyong So went as the person in charge,
but wouldn’t he have tried to solve some big issues in that case?” He also
pointed out, “He went and couldn’t even meet with the South Korean president so
it seems like a fruitless step.”
“When Vice Marshal Cho Myung Rok, first vice chairman of the
National Defense Commission, visited the U.S. [in 2000 to meet President Clinton]
and Choe Ryong Hae went to China [in 2013 as a special envoy for Kim Jong Eun]
the circumstances made sense,” he elaborated.
“To send a high-ranking group including the director of the
KPA General Political Department for a sports competition [2014 Incheon
Asian Games] on Kim Jong Eun’s private jet to the South: isn’t it difficult to
comprehend?”
Moreover, the source expressed doubts that donned in his
military uniform with rank insignia on full display, Hwang Pyong So intended to
meet the South Korean president. His reasoning being that in May of last year,
the former head of the General Political Department of the KPA, Choe Ryong Hae,
during his visit to China as a special envoy for Kim Jong Eun, wore civilian
attire during his meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping.
During Cho Myong Rok’s 2000 visit to the US to meet with
President Clinton, North Korean state media reported on the meeting, “Cho Myong
Rok went to the U.S. as a special envoy for the Great General [Kim Jong Il] and
received a warm welcome from the U.S. president.” However, this most
recent delegation earned only a brief mention upon its departure from the North
and no acknowledgement since its return.
