Dawenxi Press

中国人民的又一位老朋友，朝鲜国防委员长金正日于当地时间12月17日8时30分（北京时间12月17日7时30分）去世。

朝鲜劳动党中央委员会、朝鲜劳动党中央军事委员会、朝鲜民主主义人民共和国国防委员会、最高人民会议常任委员会、内阁发表了《告全体党员、人民军官兵和人民书》，要求全体党员、人民军官兵和人民“忠于尊敬的金正恩同志的领导”，党和人民军队以及人民保持团结。

让我们化悲痛为力量，继续团结在青年大将同志周围，努力建设eNorth Korea。

Highest leader of North Korea, Kim Jong Il passed way.

Kim Jong-il, the reclusive North Korean leader who has been battling ill health following a reported stroke in 2008, has died, the North’s official news media reported on Monday.
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Mr. Kim was 69 years old. Since he reportedly suffered a stroke in 2008, he has been grooming his third son, Kim Jong-un, believed to be in his late 20s, to be his successor, as his country struggled to fight widespread food shortages and international sanctions imposed for its nuclear weapons development.

Called the “Dear Leader” by his people, Mr. Kim, the son of North Korea’s founder, remained an unknowable figure. Everything about him was guesswork, from the exact date and place of his birth, to the mythologized events of his rise in a country formed by the hasty division of the Korean Peninsula at the end of World War II.

North Koreans heard about him only as their “peerless leader” and “the great successor to the revolutionary cause.” Yet he fostered what was perhaps the last personality cult in the Communist world. His portrait hangs beside that of his father, Kim Il-sung, in every North Korean household and building. Towers, banners and even rock faces across the country bear slogans praising him.