In addition to watching for signs that North Korea’s Kim Jong Un is willing to discuss his nation’s alarming rise as a nuclear state, Korea experts hope the potentially unscripted setting of a summit with President Trump could offer valuable clues about his leadership, health and personality.
In the next several weeks, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un could take historic steps toward peace on a long-divided peninsula, attending a highly anticipated summit with his counterpart from South Korea, and perhaps one soon after with President Trump.
For some, Kim’s actual, physical steps are also important.
In addition to watching for signs that the reclusive leader is willing to discuss his nation’s alarming rise as a nuclear state, Korea experts hope a potentially unscripted setting could offer valuable clues about his leadership, personality — and health.
The planned summit next month with South Korean President Moon Jae-in, scheduled for a diplomatic outpost on their shared border inside the Demilitarized Zone, could offer a trove of fresh details about the North Korean leader.
“North Korea is such a data-poor area,” said Melissa Hanham, a senior research associate with the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies in Monterey, who studies imagery for clues about North Korea’s emerging nuclear and missile programs. “Every bit of information we get, we try to use as well as we can.”
Kim is rarely, if ever, photographed by outsiders, and his image in state media is as tightly controlled as that of any leader in the world.
So the summit offers the possibility — though the details remain murky — that Kim might be videotaped, even shown live, while walking to meet with Moon at the Peace House, the planned summit location on the South Korean side of the truce village known as Panmunjom.
The young leader, thought to be 34 and about 5 feet 6, has grown quite heavy during his six years in power, leading some to wonder whether he might suffer from diabetes or gout, perhaps. (His grandfather, North Korea’s patriarch, Kim Il Sung, ruled with a massive growth at the back of his neck that was largely shielded from cameras over the years).
Korea experts will watch Kim’s steps, but also be closely monitoring other details, such as whether the leader wears a western-style suit, as he did during a recent New Year’s Day speech, or sticks to his customary Mao-inspired outfits.
Kim’s body language and interaction with aides — and leaders representing longtime adversaries — could also offer valuable clues about his leadership.
“There is so much that we can learn,” said Jenny Town, assistant director of the U. S.-Korea Institute at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies.
Details about the meeting remain unclear, as does the possibility of resolving the thorny disputes between the two sides. The North’s ballistic missile and nuclear weapons programs will be a central discussion point, and the presence of the United States, a key South Korean ally, on the peninsula is likely to factor in the talks.
