Problem in the Control Tower

DPRK political culture finds itself undergoing a major transition in organization, processes and personnel.

With personnel changes made during the 11th plenary session of the Workers’ Party of Korea [WPK] Central Committee held in December 2024, the following has occurred during the first quarter of 2025.

• on 27 January, a meeting of the Secretariat was convened in expanded session which detailed two incidents whereby WPK county and local government officials abused their positions
• satellite meetings were convened at the provincial and local levels at which additional incidents of corruption and abuse of power were leveled at a variety of local officials
• the WPK’s leading propaganda official, WPK Secretary Ri Il Hwan (Ri Il-hwan) has not made any public appearances since 1 January (about 100 days)
• Two top party officials appointed during the December 2024 plenary meeting, WPK Secretary for Cadres’ (personnel) Affairs and Central Inspection Commission (CIC) Chairman Ri Hi Yong (Ri Hi-yo’ng) and WPK Discipline Inspection Department Director Kim Jae Ryong (Kim Ch’ae-ryong), assumed greater public prominence—Ri convened the 27 January Secretariat meeting (and presumably the local satellite meetings), and Ri and Kim expanded their roles  and importance among Kim Jong Un’s (KJU; Kim Cho’ng-u’n) advisers
• KJU limited the number of visitors to five (5) close aides when he went to Ku’msusan on 16 February to mark his father’s birthday; the usual entourage of Political Bureau members and senior officials made a separate visit
• Ri Pyong Chol, a top defense industry and military adviser to KJU, went into semi-retirement at the end of March and has vacated his positions as a member of the WPK Political Bureau Presidium and Vice Chairman of the WPK Central Military Commission [CMC].  There is a discrepancy in ROKG reporting about Ri’s status after the December plenum.
• WPK Secretary and Organization Guidance Department [OGD] Director Jo Yong Won (Cho Yo’ng-wo’n) has not appeared in public for over 40 days

When Pyongyang embarks on organization, process or personnel changes, we might ask what needs drove the changes.   The 80th anniversary of the WPK’s foundation will take place in October and the 9th Party Congress will convene at some point in 2026.  KJU and the regime want to attain forward progress on economic development, infrastructure and construction projects to demonstrate the virtues of WPK leadership.

Jo Yong Won’s unusual public absence might be ascribed to Jo having to conduct off-the-record project inspections to ensure efficiency and progress from lower-level officials.  The run-up to a party congress involves background investigations of party officials and WPK members—it’s an opportunity to lose dead weight—so the CIC and DID personnel changes can be linked to next year’s congress.  The WPK faces two large public events during the next year—the anniversary and the 9th Party Congress—so a propaganda secretary like Ri Il Hwan might be absent because he’s involved in planning for those.

One or two of these things is not unique, but the combination of these things—top officials going missing, a vacancy on the Political Bureau Presidium, disclosures about wayward or corrupt officials—in such a short period of time indicates something bigger at play.   As stated above, we do not know precisely what that is.  However, if we examine the impact and some of the circumstances during the first quarter of 2025 we might derive better insight into what has happened.

• Ri Pyong Chol’s semi-retirement created a vacancy on the Political Bureau Presidium.
• The extended absence of Ri Il Hwan is unusual, particularly as Ri’s portfolio includes “information and publicity.”  WPK Propaganda and Agitation Department [PAD] Ju Chang Il (Chu Chang-il) has served as a surrogate for Ri at public events as early as the summer of 2024.  However, at that time Ri Il Hwan had not disappeared.
• Ri’s lengthy absence suggests a disciplinary issue.  If Ri Il Hwan had a medical issue and was in good standing with the regime, he would have at least attended the Supreme People’s Assembly (SPA) in January and/or the Secretariat meeting.  The length of his absence is currently outside the short-term course at the Higher Party School (6-8 weeks) which make it highly probable that he has been “sent down” for more extensive revolutionary education.
• The promotion and sudden prominence of Ri Hi Yong after the Central Committee plenum is unusual considering that he did not have a known position in the regime and did not have Central Committee member at the time of his elevation.
• Ri led a high level DPRK delegation on a visit to Russia for exchanges with the United Russia Party and met President Vladimir Putin.  All of these indicate the importance of Ri’s position in the regime.
• Ri Hi Yong replaced Kim Jae Ryong in running cadres (personnel) affairs and chairing the CIC, a triple hatted position first held by Kim who moved to the DID; from 2021 to 2024 Ri was CIC Vice Chairman.
• Ri Hi Yong influenced the convocation of the Secretariat meeting in January, which was indicated when he was observed directing the line-up of Secretariat members before the meeting was called to order.
• During the Secretariat meeting, Kim Jae Ryong wore a KJU lapel badge
• Ri and Kim Jae Ryong were part of KJU’s smaller visiting party to Ku’msusan on 16 February
• KJU’s visiting party to Ku’msusan also included Kim Yo Jong (Kim Yo’-cho’ng), WPK Secretary of Military Affairs MAR Pak Jong Chon (Pak Cho’ng-chon) and Minister of National Defense GEN No Kwang Chol (No Kwang-ch’o’l).
• The visiting party may have been due to a scheduling conflict with the wider leadership, however it may have been intended to show his current core inner circle of advisers.
• Three (3) of the five (5) elites at KJU’s Ku’msusan visit were appointed within the last six months (Kim and Ri in December and GEN No in October).

There are some broad trends we might glean from this.  Ri Pyong Chol’s migration into semi-retirement represents a major shift in policy and decisionmaking in the defense industry with Ri having served as a key official since 2014, just over a decade.  His previous portfolio is now scattered around to other elites—Pak Jong Chon on the CMC with its oversight responsibilities, GEN No Kwang Chol for aspects of military modernization and systems acquisition and WPK Secretary for Munitions Industry Jo Chun Ryong (Cho Chun-ryong) for aspects around R&D and production.  It is also highly probable that elites with patronage ties to Ri Pyong Chol are being moved to other positions.

The emergence of Ri Hi Yong and Kim Jae Ryong both in public prominence and in KJU’s inner circle is tied to two of KJU’s initiatives for internal regime affairs.  Ri leads the revamped WPK Cadres’ Affairs Department [CAD] which is involved the education, training and job appointment of North Korean officials in the party and government all the way to the rank of deputy director (in the WPK) and Vice Minister (in the DPRK Government).

Ri holds an expanded position as he also concurrently chair the CIC—the individual responsible for recruiting, appointing and dismissing regime officials also leads efforts monitoring and punishing their professional and personal conduct.  This consolidates the functions of the regime’s leading human resources official.  Ri replaced Kim Jae Ryong in the CAD-CIC position with Kim having held the position for about two years.  Given his close ties to KJU and career history, Kim Jae Ryong was most likely tasked to develop processes, information channels and control mechanisms to be make the CAD-CIC position effective before turning it over to a more permanent official like Ri Hi Yong.

For his part, Kim Jae Ryong migrated to DID.  It is highly probable that he has been similarly tasked to make the department more effective by restructuring processes and organizational interactions.  DID was created at the 8th Party Congress in January 2021 and has had four directors over four years.  Considering that the previous DID directors remain in good standing with the regime, we might interpret that Kim Jae Ryong has the experience and gravitas to make DID effective in its mission.

One hypothetical scenario worth considering is that the elevations of Ri Hi Yong and Kim Jae Ryong may be tied to Ri Pyong Chol’s semi-retirement and Ri Il Hwan’s public absence.  After their December 2024 appointments and taking office, the Secretariat meeting was held a month later.  It is reasonable to surmise that after transitioning into these positions they found CIC or DID case files implicating top elites directly or via patronage/social network channels to corrupt or illicit behavior.

Less hypothetical, is the underlying dynamic between Jo Yong Won on one hand, and Ri Hi Yong and Kim Jae Ryong on the other.  The two cases taken up at the Secretariat meeting involved county party committees, which are subordinate to Jo Yong Won’s OGD.  While Jo spoke at the Secretariat meeting, Ri Hi Yong called it to order.

Jo was certainly part of the decisionmaking through which CIC was revamped and DID established back in 2020, but he probably did not expect two individuals from outside OGD to exert such authority over his own department in such public fashion.  At the very least, it appears that Jo is being undermined.

Another aspect to the Ri/Kim and Jo Yong Won relationship is that both served with or under Jo at OGD.  Kim Jae Ryong was OGD Director from August 2020 to June 2022 and under that position chaired the 8th Party Congress preparatory committee.  In June 2022 he migrated to the CAD/CIC position and Jo became OGD director.

Ri Hi Yong was a senior OGD deputy director from 2020 until 2024.  After about 18 months with Jo as OGD director, Ri was removed from office and did not seem to hold an active position.  In July 2024, Ri was appointed chief party secretary of North P’yo’ngan Province as part of emergency response efforts.  At the December plenum when he was promoted, Ri did not have Central Committee status and sat toward the back of the meeting hall.

These details suggest a division, even a rivalry, between Jo Yong Won against Ri Hi Yong and Kim Jae Ryong.   Neither Ri nor Kim lasted longer than two years working under or alongside Jo Yong Won in OGD.  Ri and Kim have gone onto high positions in institutions intended to balance OGD’s authority in the regime.  Finally, with Ri and Kim leading those institutions they seemed to target administrative units and personnel directly under Jo’s OGD supervision.

During the first quarter of 2025, Jo Yong Won’s standing and profile in the regime has gradually reduced.  Jo did not appear in public for over 40 days between February and April.  Jo also did not attend the SPA session in January.

At the last three engagements he attended with KJU, Jo was not named in state media reporting; at two KPA-related events, his attendance was reported with other CMC members.  At a visit to the construction of the Pyongyang General Hospital, his attendance was reported among “officials of the Party Central Committee.”  This is notable because DPRK Premier Pak Thae Song (Pak T’ae-so’ng) was identified as a Political Bureau Presidium Member, but Jo was not.  In most images of all three events, Jo was shown off to the side or in the background.

Since July, Jo Yong Won has not had an easy time.  After floods devastated North P’yo’ngan and Chagang Provinces, a Political Bureau meeting held in situ replaced the North P’yo’ngan and Chagang provincial party secretaries and the Minister of Public Security.  All are positions which Jo supervises at OGD.  Jo is certainly linked in some fashion—either in his official capacity or more directly—to Ri Il Hwan’s public absence.

Jo Yong Won’s career is certainly undergoing a setback.  KJU has probably found an intolerably higher degree of dysfunction in the regime’s mechanics than he anticipated and Jo was singled out.  Now, it’s Jo’s task to mitigate Pyongyang’s monkey business.

Conversely, Jo is on the edge of glory as KJU’s chief surrogate.  All of these personnel matters and process changes derive from his advice, if not design.

Jo Yong Won has previously attracted attention in mainstream North Korea watching as being the WPK’s “First Secretary” thus the formal #2 in leadership hierarchy.  DPRK state media has never formally referred to Jo by any such title.  However, if he has been driving these changes, then we could be seeing evidence of a First Secretary’s role.

And yet, in either case, Jo Yong Won has at least lost one of his nine lives.