Kim Jong-un spends $1.82 billion per year on elite perks, report says

North Korea

Published: 01 May. 2024, 19:05

Kim Jong-un spends $1.82 billion per year on elite perks, report says

In this footage broadcast by Pyongyang's state-controlled Korean Central Television on April 26, a Russian-made Aurus luxury sedan believed to be carrying North Korean leader Kim Jong-un is escorted by a convoy of previously unseen Toyota Land Cruisers to a ceremony at Kim Il Sung Military University to mark the 92nd anniversary of the founding of the regime's armed forces. [YONHAP]

North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has spent up to 2.5 trillion won ($1.82 billion) per year on perks enjoyed by his regime’s elites to reward and maintain their loyalty, according to a South Korean government report released Tuesday.

The study, which was conducted jointly by Seoul’s Defense Ministry and the affiliated Korea Institute for Defense Analyses (KIDA), estimated that up to 65,000 people who are members of Pyongyang’s ruling Workers’ Party, military and government each receive an average of 40 million won in benefits from the regime.

According to KIDA researcher Oh Kyung-seob, the North Korean leader “promotes and consolidates loyalty from the [North’s] elites by distributing gifts as a matter of policy.”

Perks enjoyed by North Korean elites include not only housing, food, health care, personal protection and access to various entertainment and cultural facilities, but also luxury imports that are banned under international sanctions but still find their way into the North.

Such marks of status were on full display in footage of the Workers’ Party plenary session broadcast by state television in December, which showed Premier Kim Tok-hun, Workers’ Party deputy chief Jo Yong-won and Supreme People’s Assembly Standing Committee Chairman Choe Ryong-hae arriving at the meeting in Mercedes-Benz S-class sedans.

Senior KIDA fellow Park Yong-han said the study's estimates “were derived from various sources of information and detailed questioning of high-level North Korean defectors,” but declined to disclose data obtained from specific individuals due to restrictions on sharing South Korean intelligence on the North.

The latest study’s estimates largely align with those of a report filed by the South Korean spy agency to the National Assembly’s Intelligence Committee in April 2015, which also estimated the number of North Koreas elites to be about 60,000.

Most South Korean experts agree that elites in North Korea include not only Kim Jong-un’s immediate family and his relatives, but also members of the Workers’ Party Politburo, Central Committee, working departments and various other committees, as well as the military’s generals and political advisers and high-ranking officials of the State Council, Cabinet and State Security Ministry.

The authors of the recent study told the JoongAng Ilbo that such privileged North Koreans are subdivided into four different ranks, with members of Kim’s so-called Paektu bloodline, descendants of communist guerrillas and prominent families making up the core of the elite.

Researchers estimated that this core class includes only 22,000 people, or 0.1 percent of the total North Korean population.

The study’s authors also calculated that Kim Jong-un’s family and relatives together spend around 830 billion won per year on luxury goods for themselves — only 28 billion won less than the 858 billion won it would cost the regime to pay for its annual grain shortfall of 1.1 million tons.

BY MICHAEL LEE [lee.junhyuk@joongang.co.kr]