Kim Jong-Un calls for urgent meeting next week to tackle 'unfavorable conditions'

North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un convened this year’s first meeting of top party officials on Friday wherein he discussed ‘urgent’ issues pertaining to state planning. While not much has been disclosed about the meeting, state-run outlets revealed that a second and larger meet was scheduled to be held next week. Friday’s meeting at the party political bureau also marked iron-fisted ruler’s first public appearance in about a month.

According to state-run outlets Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) and Rodong Sinmun, Kim talked about the results of January’s landmark party congress so far, and “stressed it is now necessary to call a plenary meeting of the Party Central Committee” to “solve pending problems urgent for the economic work and people’s living.” The upcoming meet will see more party workers gather at the plenum to modify defects by “rightly” summing up the general state affairs in the first half of the year. The upcoming plenum is the third so far with the previous ones being held in January and February.

While the 37-year-old leader lauded the ongoing efforts in the country, he highlighted that state affairs faced "many challenges and restrictions" due to "prevailing unfavourable subjective and objective conditions and environment." North Korea has not reported even a single case of COVID but experts have claimed that it might not be the case accusing the hermit state of hiding infections. The politburo on Friday also talked about the “structural reorganization of departments of the Central Committee of the Party,” according to KCNA.

Jong-Un's reappearance 

Jong-Un had not made a single appearance since May 6 after he attended a military event, marking his longest absence this year. The dictator’s unconfirmed whereabouts for over three weeks had raised speculations about his health. The Korean Herald confirmed that the North Korean dictator had been sending letters to foreign leaders but had largely abstained from any public events. 

Asked if there was anything “unusual” about the Jong-Un’s hiatus amid rising speculations of deteriorated health, the North Korean administration denied such rumours. The 37-year-old authoritarian leader had gone missing for at least six weeks in 2014 fuelling rumours about his "death" but eventually did appear on state TV walking with a cane stick as experts speculated that he had perhaps suffered from gout. 

File Image: KoreanCentralNewsAgency/ AP