The Courier & Advertiser (Perth and Perthshire Edition)
Kim Jong Un rides white horse in propaganda stunt aimed at USA
North Korean leader Kim Jong Un mounted a white horse in an evocative propaganda stunt as his own deadline for US movement on nuclear talks is nearing.
The images in his country’s official media showed a bespectacled Mr Kim, wearing a long, light-brown coat and riding up snow-covered Mount Paektu on horseback.
The location and the animal are symbols associated with the Kim family’s dynastic rule.
The highest point on the Korean Peninsula is sacred to North Koreans, and Mr Kim has visited it before making major decisions such as the 2013 execution of his powerful uncle and his 2018 entrance into diplomacy with Seoul and Washington.
The images and Mr Kim’s comments were released days after his country’s first nuclear negotiations with the US in more than seven months fell apart.
South Korean media quickly speculated Kim may be considering a new strategy in his dealings with the US because he’s previously demanded Washington come up with new proposals to salvage the stalemated diplomacy by the end of December.
“He, sitting on the horseback atop Mt Paektu, recollected with deep emotion the road of arduous struggle he covered for the great cause of building the most powerful country with faith and will as firm as Mt Paektu,” the North’s official Korean Central News Agency said.
The official biography of Kim Jong Un’s father, Kim Jong Il, said the secondgeneration leader was born on Paektu when a double rainbow filled the skies.
The white horse is also a propaganda symbol for the Kim family that has ruled North Korea for seven decades.