North Korean House of Cards

a. Personal Secretariat Personnel and Structure
According to several sources, Kim Sol-song, Kim Jong-un’s half-sister, leads
his Personal Secretariat. 345, 346 By many accounts, Kim Sol-song was Kim Jong-il’s
favorite child. She was the first of two daughters born to Kim Jong-il and his second
wife, Kim Yong-suk, and the only grandchild apparently recognized by Kim Il-sung.
Kim Jong-il mentioned Kim Sol-song in his last will and testament, noting that she
“should be supported as a caretaker of Jong-un.” 347
Kim Sol-song, at age 41, has extensive experience working inside the Party
and state apparatus. She was born in 1974 and began work in Kim Il-sung’s
Presidential Office in her teens. She moved to the KWP PAD, where she worked
with one of her father’s closest associates, Kim Ki-nam. In the late 1990s, she moved
into her father’s Personal Secretariat, as a department head and Chief of Office 99, 348
which had responsibility for some of the more sensitive financial accounts and the
acquisition and proliferation of technology. 349 In the 2000s, reports began to surface
that Kim Sol-song had become one of her father’s closest aides. A multilingual
speaker, she served as her father’s interpreter on several of his trips, including his
2002 trip to Russia. She is also rumored to be an officer in the GC and most likely
had liaison responsibilities with this body in coordinating her father’s security. She
allegedly is very close to her aunt, Kim Kyong-hui, as well as Kim Ok, 350 with whom
she worked closely in Kim Jong-il’s Personal Secretariat.
345 Author’s interviews in Seoul, April 2013. According to one defector, Kim Sol-song is not the
first Director of Kim Jong-un’s Personal Secretariat. There have been several directors as the institution
has evolved.
346 Jeong Yong-Soo and Kim Hee-Jin, “Pyongyang Did China Business As It Purged Jang,” Korea
JoongAng Daily, December 12, 2013; Michael Madden, “Biographies: Kim Chang-son,” North Korea
Leadership Watch, May 14, 2013. According to one source, Kim Jong-un’s original Chief of Staff was Kim
Jang-son. In January 2012, he formally replaced Jon Hui-jong, Director of the NDC Foreign Affairs
Bureau, as the Supreme Leader’s Chief Protocol Officer and Kang Sang-chun as Director of the Personal
Secretariat. This essentially created the firewall between the Personal Secretariat and SOCC, which
were intertwined during Kang’s tenure as Kim Jong-il’s senior aide.
347 Kim Hee-Jin, “Before His Death, Kim Jong Il Wrote Instructions,” Korea JoongAng Daily,
April 14, 2012.
348 Ken E. Gause, North Korea Under Kim Chong-il: Power, Politics, and Prospects for Change, op. cit.
349 “North Korea Creates New Front Company to Supply Iran With Nuclear Technology,” Moscow
Times, April 27, 2010; “DPRK’s Office 99 Said to Have Played Central Role in Syrian Nuclear Project,”
NHK General Television, April 25, 2008; Nicolas Levi, “A Big Day for the Elite Clans,” Daily NK, April 10,
2012. In more recent reports, Kim Sol-song was identified as a high-level bureaucrat in the KWP MID.
350 “Kim Jong-il’s Widow ‘Purged’,” The Chosun Ilbo, July 3, 2013. According to recent South
Korean reporting, Kim Ok and her father Kim Hyo, a Deputy Director of the KWP FAD, have been
dismissed from all their posts. It is not clear whether this was a purge or is tied to their health. Kim Hyo
is in his 90s and his daughter allegedly tried to commit suicide following Kim Jong-il’s death. Kim Ok
appeared at various leadership events during the mourning period and then disappeared from public view.
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