North Korea’s ambassador to Kuwait has moved to the South in a continuing sign of rebellion against Kim Jong Un.
Ryu Hyun Woo actually reached South Korea in September 2019, but it was just revealed by Tae Yong Ho, a fellow Hermit from the Hermit Kingdom, who is now a lawmaker in Seoul.
“I decided to defect because I wanted to offer my child a better future,” Ryu told Agence France-Presse (AFP), referring to the newspaper Maeil Business.
Ryu has led the North Korean embassy in Kuwait since former ambassador So Chang Sik was suspended after a UN resolution in 2017 sought to downsize the country’s overseas diplomatic missions.
It is considered an important message because Kuwait is a major source of foreign exchange for Pyongyang, which has sent thousands of workers there.
Ryu is also the son-in-law of Jon Il Chun, who once oversaw a Labor Party bureau responsible for managing the secret coffee cupboard of the ruling Kim family, called Room 39.
His departure could be a sign that the North Korean elite building Kim’s power base is drifting away from him, Tae said.
About 30,000 North Koreans fled oppression and poverty under communist rule and settled in the capitalist South, according to the AFP.
In early 2019, North Korea’s ambassador to Italy, Jo Song Gil, disappeared from the embassy with his wife and reappeared in South Korea.
Tae was also an overlord and fled from his position as North Korea’s deputy ambassador to Britain before settling in the South in 2016.
Now a politician in the South, he encourages others to follow his path to a new life.
“I want to tell my colleagues working around the world and the North Korean elite that there is an alternative to North Korea and that the door is open,” Tae said in an interview at the recent Reuters Next conference. said.
The National Intelligence Service declined to comment.
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