DPRK senior party official Kim Yang Gon killed in vehicle accident

Kim was one of key associates of leader Kim Jong Un, who took power upon the death of his dictator father Kim Jong Il in late 2011.

Kim accompanied the late North Korean leader during the summit and is also one of only a handful of North Korean officials who visited South Korea multiple times.

In 2007, he was appointed to lead the United Front Department and led the work of arranging the 2007 inter-Korean summit between then South Korean President Roh Moo-hyun and then North Korean leader Kim Jong-il.

“This raises worries that an extended suspension in inter- Korean dialogue may be inevitable due to his death”, Cheong Seong-chang, a North Korea analyst at the Sejong Institute near Seoul, said by text message.

It appeared that Kim’s death was indeed accidental, despite North Korea’s notorious habit of purging high-ranking officials.

SEOUL – South Korea’s financial watchdog said Wednesday it has picked 19 large companies to be placed under debt restructuring this year as part of efforts to prevent a sudden default in major industries.

“Comrade Kim Yang-gon, a Workers’ Party secretary and member of the party Central Committee Politbureau died in a traffic accident at 6:15am Tuesday [local time] at age 73″, the North’s Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) said.

“Our comrade, Kim Yang-gon has devotedly fought to realize our party’s policy of independent national reunification”, the KCNA said in a report.

“North Korea has a long track record of suspicious deaths around high-level officials”, North Korea expert Andrei Lankov told Reuters.

The North did not reveal details about the accident said to have killed Kim Yang-Gon, but a disproportionately high rate of fatal crashes among the North’s powerful elites has been attributed to reckless driving, often under the influence of alcohol.

The most dramatic example was the young leader’s uncle Jang Song Thaek, who was executed in 2013 and described by state media as “despicable human scum”.

The North Korean regime is famous for its secrecy and isolation, making it unlikely it will give a full account of what happened to Kim Yang Gon. The two Koreas finally reached a six-point agreement to defuse the rising tensions, including plans to hold inter-governmental meetings and reunions for separated families split by the 1950-53 Korean War.