Meet Kim Yo-jong: North Korea's Most Powerful Woman

[soryang]

Meet Kim Yo-jong: North Korea’s Most Powerful Woman (Part I)
by Harry J. Kazianis John Dale Grover Adriana Nazarko Dong Geon Lim
July 24 The National Interest

...Though nobody knows for sure, research strongly suggests Kim Yo-jong is believed to have been born in North Korea on September 26, 1987, as the youngest child between Kim Jong-il and his third consort, Ko Yong-hui. Yo-jong’s lineage is not well known in North Korea, and not without reason. Her mother was originally from the Tsuruhashi district in Osaka, Japan where she went by the name “Takada Hime.” Yo-jong’s grandmother is ethnically Japanese, while her maternal Korean grandfather, Ko Gyon-tek, worked at the Hirota sewing factory in Osaka under the Japanese ministry of war making military uniforms.

Ko Yong-hui’s Japanese ancestry, her status as a zainichi—an ethnically Korean resident of Japan—and her father’s role with the Japanese Imperial Army puts her firmly at the lowest tier (적대 ) of North Korea’s songbun caste system, despite her family’s repatriation to North Korea. Because songbun is tied closely with ancestry, Yo-jong and her brothers should also belong to this lowest class, notwithstanding their royal “paektu” bloodline...

More: https://nationalinterest.org/blog/korea-watch/meet-kim-yo-jong-north-korea%E2%80%99s-most-powerful-woman-68902

Interesting biographical sketch by Kazianis et al. Looking forward to part II.