Japan deports North Korean leader's son to China By Gillian Tett in Tokyo and James Kynge in Beijing
A man thought to be the eldest son and heir-apparent of Kim Jong-il, the North Korean leader, arrived in China on Friday after having been deported from Tokyo for trying to enter Japan on a fake passport to visit Disneyland.
The man, believed to be Kim Jong-nam, the 29-year-old son of Mr Kim, was ushered into a VIP reception room at Beijing airport.
China, the closest ally of reclusive North Korea, was expected to allow him and his three travelling companions to return to Pyongyang without delay. Nevertheless, the incident was a blow to the austere image that North Korea seeks to cultivate under its state ideology of juche, or self-reliance.
The younger Mr Kim, who was educated in Geneva and Moscow,claimed that he wanted to go to Disneyland in Japan. He was travelling on a Dominican Republic passport that carried a Chinese name.
At Beijing airport, Mr Kim appeared snappily dressed in a brown quilted leather jerkin and small gold-rimmed spectacles. His companions carried Louis Vuitton suitcases. Two North Korean embassy cars with tinted windows left the airport.
Officials in Pyongyang last month said that the younger Mr Kim was expected to succeed his father as the nation's leader, just as Kim Jong-il took over from Kim Il-sung, his father, in 1994. It is the only existing Stalinist state wedded to a system of dynastic succession.
Japan's decision to expel Mr Kim was designed to avoid any diplomatic "embarrassment" with North Korea, Japanese officials said. Japan is deeply wary of taking any step that would provoke North Korea or China, at a time when regional relations are already becoming more tense amid unease about the direction of US foreign policy.
The new US administration has indicated in recent weeks that it plans to take a tougher line towards China and is unwilling to normalise relations with North Korea. Japan has a military alliance with the US.
However, Tokyo is trying to avoid any further deterioration of its relations with China and North Korea. Consequently, Japan's foreign ministry is trying to maintain a low-key, ambiguous silence on most regional matters - including the latest, bizarre episode with Mr Kim.
Japanese immigration officials have indicated that he has made several trips into Japan on the false passport, and he is believed to speak good Japanese. Indeed, Kyodo news agency reported that Kim Jong-nam had visited Tokyo Disneyland before.
North Korea has had bitter battles with Japan, and Kim Il-Sung rose to power as a freedom fighter against the occupation of the North Korea peninsula by the Japanese between 1910 and 1945. However, modern Japan has a large population of Koreans, some of whom support North Korean regime, remit money to the Stalinist state and make frequent visits.
Kim Jong-il is believed to have four children, all by different women. Like his son, he is believed to have made extensive secret trips overseas in the past, under false identities.