North Korea: As 13 days of mourning end, Kim Jong un becomes “supreme leader”

Seoul – At the end of 13 days of mourning for ‘dear leader’ Kim Jong-il, North Korea has officially crowned Kim Jong-un as the country’s new “supreme leader”.

Speaking before an assembled crowd of tens of thousands of soldiers and civilians in Kim Il-sung Square, Pyongyang’s main open space area, Kim Yong-nam, the regime’s number two, praised the dead leader for contributing to global peace and stability in the 21st century.

Now “Respected Comrade Kim Jong-un is our party, military and country's supreme leader who inherits great comrade Kim Jong-il's ideology, leadership, character, virtues, grit and courage,” Kim Yong-nam said.

Wearing a dark coat and flanked by military commanders and senior members of the party, Kim Jong-un stood impassively on the balcony of a government building as the funeral ceremony went on. He did not address the crowd.

Workers, citizens, children and soldiers across the country bowed for three minutes of tribute to Kim Jong-il as trains and boats blew their sirens.

The ceremony was choreographed to show confidence in the young new leader, who must now run a country with a bankrupt economy on the edge of disaster and a nuclear programme that has alienated the West.

Food shortages are the main problem. According to the United Nations, at least six million people, or a quarter of the total population, need urgent food aid.