Korean leader’s ex survives rumor mill
BEIJING — Yet another urban legend about North Korea bites the dust.
The ex-girlfriend of leader Kim Jong Un, reportedly executed by firing squad last year, turned up apparently alive and well on a state television broadcast Friday night.
Hyon Song Wol was reported to be one of 10 to 12 people executed in August by firing squad for performing in pornographic videos sold in China.
But there she was Friday speaking at a national meeting of artists in Pyongyang, where she thanked Kim for his support of the arts and promised to “stoke up the flame for art and creative work.”
Her execution had first been reported by Chosun Ilbo, a South Korean newspaper known for its staunchly antiCommunist views and its criticism of North Korea.
“Kim Jong Un has been viciously eliminating anyone who he deems a challenge to his authority,” the newspaper reported in August, citing unnamed sources.
Because of its secrecy and eccentricity, North Korea is an ideal breeding ground for outrageous rumors, often involving exotic methods of torture and execution. Last year, a story went viral that Kim Jong Un’s purged uncle, Jang Sung Taek, had been stripped naked and devoured alive by a pack of hungry dogs. Jang had been executed, but there was no evidence of the dog story.
“Something about (North Korea’s) media-resistant nature, along with several other factors, gives rise to all manner of rumors, some mundane, some bizarre, some of significance,” wrote Korea expert Andray Abrahamian of Chosun Exchange, an educational exchange organization, on the website NKnews.org.
So much news-of-the-weird has sprung out of the country that NKnews.org tabulated what it called the “Top 10 most bizarre rumors to spread about North Korea.”
Among the winners: North Korean scientists have discovered evidence that unicorns actually exist. Kim Jong Il (the former leader) hit 18 holes-inone the first time he played golf. A North Korean missile landed in Alaska.
And Kim Jong Il kidnapped a South Korean film director to make his own Godzilla film.
Well, that last rumor turned out to be true.