TAIPEI, Taiwan – A growing unofficial power network led by North Korea’s parliamentary chief Choe Ryong Hae is reshaping the country’s political hierarchy, potentially becoming a destabilising force within leader Kim Jong Un’s regime, according to a new South Korean analysis.
Choe, one of North Korea’s most influential officials, is a close ally of the Kim family. He gained major influence after becoming director of the Organisation and Guidance Department, or OGD, in 2017, effectively acting as the regime’s second-in-command with a wide-reaching informal power network.
Since then, Choe’s inner circle has rapidly ascended to key positions across the party, military, and state institutions, said South Korea’s National Assembly Research Service in a report published on Saturday. Its findings are based on an analysis of publicly available information, including reports from North Korea’s state-run media outlets.
The report identifies key military figures – Ri Yong Gil, No Kwang Chol, and Kim Su Gil – as part of Choe’s informal network. All three worked closely with Choe during his earlier stint as director of the General Political Bureau in 2012 and were later promoted to top military posts: Chief of the General Staff, Minister of People’s Armed Forces, and Director of the General Political Bureau, respectively.
Similarly, several lesser-known party figures, including cabinet premier Pak Thae Song, have emerged in prominent central roles, riding the wave of Choe’s expanding influence, according to the report.
This concentration of power has come at the cost of internal checks and balances that shore up the North’s authoritarian Supreme Leader system among the elite, the report said.
Once seen as a potential Choe counterweight, Kim Yo Jong – leader Kim Jong Un’s sister – stepped down from all formal posts at the 8th Party Congress in January 2021, following a surge in succession rumors the previous year.
Several media reports, citing Chinese sources, have claimed that Kim Yo Jong married Choe’s son, although this has not been officially confirmed.
Another former challenger, Jo Yong Won, attempted to bolster his influence by holding dual positions in the party and military, but was curbed by Choe’s aggressive consolidation of power. Jo’s recent appearances have been largely limited to provincial development events.
The Kim family has historically maintained its grip on power through a tightly controlled hereditary system, centralizing authority around the Supreme Leader.
Key positions in the party, military, and state have consistently been filled by loyalists or family members, reinforcing dynastic rule.
The founder Kim Il Sung established the model of absolute leadership, which was passed down to Kim Jong Il and later to Kim Jong Un, with propaganda, purges, and elite surveillance used to eliminate rivals and ensure total loyalty to the ruling family.
Decline in purges
The report also noted a striking decline in Kim Jong Un’s once-routine purges of senior officials – a hallmark of his earlier rule – after Choe’s appointment to the OGD in 2017.
It cited the survival of cabinet premier Kim Tok Hun, who was harshly criticized by Kim as a “political novice” in 2023, and Pak Thae Song, who botched a military satellite launch but was nonetheless granted further opportunities.
These developments, according to the report, reflect Kim Jong Un’s tacit reliance on Choe’s authority to navigate mounting economic hardships under sanctions and rapidly shifting international dynamics.
“Kim Jong Un appears to have entrusted Choe Ryong Hae with a stabilising role to maintain regime continuity amid external pressures,” the report said.
But the report also noted that the weakening of competition and oversight within North Korea’s elite class could eventually lead to instability.
“The dismantling of internal checks among the ruling elite undermines the guiding principle of surveillance and restraint that underpins the Supreme Leader system – a paradox that could compromise regime stability in the long run.”
Edited by Stephen Wright.