Secretive nature of North Korea feeds into rumors about Kim Jong Un's health, experts say

The closed-off nature of North Korea gave rise to contradictory reports late Monday about its leader, Kim Jong-un, experts told Just the News.

Confusion about North Korean dictator Kim Jong-un’s health dominated headlines late Monday, with little resolution by mid-day Tuesday.

In a series of late-night media reports, Kim was reportedly so ill that he was in “grave danger” following heart surgery, then he was brain dead, and, finally, not seriously ill.

The confusion was such that the South Korean-based Daily NK today corrected its own original report to reflect that the information on Kim came from a single source.

The U.S. intelligence community is closely tracking the situation, according to White House National Security Advisor Robert O’Brien. 

“We are monitoring these reports very closely, and as you know North Korea is a very closed society, there is not a free press there, they are parsimonious with the information they provide on many things, including the health of Kim Jong Un, ” O’Brien told reporters Tuesday.  

The paucity feeds into the types of contradictory reports that emerged on Monday, expert sources said.

“North Korean high politics are notoriously opaque,” analyst Benjamin Young, a professor at Dakota University, told Just the News. “The information scarcity with North Korea lends itself to rumors and misinformation.”

The dearth is such that Western analysts only recently learned Kim’s precise age, Young said.

Rumors about the North Korean leader previously have proved false, one military intelligence analyst said, noting that in 1986, Kim was reported to have died.

“The lack of a HUMINT [human intelligence] network in North Korea is a particular challenge,” the analyst said. “It deprives us of critical, complete information, and it helps create the perfect storm for the rumor mill.”

The mill churns swiftly, others noted.

“Most of the rumors regarding North Korea start out with a poorly sourced and single-sourced report that then gets retweeted and spread across our digital landscape very quickly,” Young said. 

The West has reason to watch closely, he also said. “If he is in bad shape, and that's a big if, there could not be a worse time for a nuclear-armed hereditary dictatorship to experience the loss of the supreme leader and perhaps have a subsequent power struggle.”

Kim appeared to be functioning as per usual, showing no signs of a health crisis, North Korean officials  reportedly said today.