Kim Jong-un chairs politburo meeting in first appearance in a month

Seoul, Jun 5 (EFE).- North Korean Leader Kim Jong-un chaired a meeting of the single-party politburo, state media reported Saturday, in what is his first public appearance in a month.

During the meeting, held Friday, a plenary meeting of the Central Committee of the Workers’ Party was organized to “adopt additional state measures to solve urgent pending problems for the economic work and the life of the people,” according to state news agency KCNA.

The agency said Kim “detailed and analyzed the execution of the main political measures in different areas during the first half of the year.”

This will be the third plenary meeting of the Central Committee this year, marked by the economic havoc that its strict protocol to contain the pandemic is causing North Korea.

Due to the pandemic, North Korea has closed its borders since January 2020.

As months have passed, the country has further tightened restrictions, limiting and disinfecting imports from China, doubling the number of border gates, increasing guard posts and ordering its army to shoot anyone who approaches its divide.

The measures appear to have affected various sectors of the impoverished North Korean economy in the face of the disappearance of tourism or foreign direct investment.

The supreme leader said the meeting in early June, whose exact date was not specified by state media, will serve “to take additional measures in order to quickly straighten out” pending issues.

This is Kim Jong-un’s first public appearance since May 6, when he participated in an event with relatives of members of the People’s Army.

The leader has greatly limited his public appearances since the pandemic began, a presumed precautionary Covid-19 measure which, given the lack of information from the country, has unleashed all kinds of speculation about his health. EFE

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