Kim's son runs in North Korean elections
Updated
It's hardly likely to be a cliff-hanger election, but the parliamentary poll in North Korea is expected to provide a hint about life after Kim Jong-il.
It's been reported that the communist dictator's third son is running in the rubber-stamp election, a sign that he's been picked to take over from the ailing Kim. The election comes as North Korea continues preparations for a inter-continental ballistic missile launch, and as tens of thousands of South Korean and US troops prepare to begin war games along its border.
Presenter: Mark Willacy
Speakers: North Korean voters
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(sound from North Korean television news report)
MARK WILLACY: With its usual breathless idolatry, North Korean state television reported Kim Jong-Il's appearance at a polling station like it had just witnessed the second coming.
The Dear Leader looked more frail than usual, gone was the prominent pot belly and jowls.
This election was due last year, but it's believed it was postponed because Kim suffered a stroke, which US and South Korean intelligence agencies believe paralysed his left hand.
While North Korean TV showed people dancing and singing, and smiling voters casting ballots, this was no exercise in democracy.
All candidates were picked by the Government or the Communist Party, and there was only one candidate in each constituency. And the exit polls all pointed to a landslide.
"I cast my ballot to support Kim Jong-Il," gushes this woman in military uniform.
"I was happy to vote for Kim," says her apparently ecstatic comrade.
While this election was decided before it was even run and won, the poll does offer a look into North Korea post-Kim Jong-Il.
South Korea's Yonhap newsagency is reporting that Kim's youngest son, Kim Jong-Un, ran in this election, yet more proof it says that the 26-year old has been chosen to succeed his father.
But in the South, the focus isn't on the poll, but on a remote piece of North Korean scrub where it's believed the Stalinist state is preparing to test fire an inter-continental ballistic missile.
Pyongyang is already in a twitchy mood, describing joint military exercises between South Korea and the United States beginning later today as preparation for an invasion of its territory.
The war games will see thousands of US troops land on the Korean Peninsula, not the sort of election present Kim Jong-Il was hoping for.
