SEOUL: North Korea’s rubber-stamp parliament at its annual meeting today will focus on ways to improve living standards after a bungled currency change sparked widespread public anger, analysts said.Members of the Supreme People’s Assembly (SPA) are effectively chosen by the ruling communist party, and they endorse the bills it puts forward without serious debate.
But the day-long session indicates the secretive regime’s priorities and any changes to the line-up among the ruling elite.
Yang Moo-Jin of Seoul’s University of North Korean Studies said legislators would approve institutional and personnel changes to bolster leader Kim Jong-Il’s power and prepare for the eventual succession of his third son Jong-Un.
The North is apparently moving to put the national police agency under the direct control of the National Defence Commission headed by Kim, he said.
It was unclear whether the leader would attend the meeting, as he did last year — looking frail and gaunt after a reported stroke.
Since then the regime has been grappling with serious food shortages and tougher UN sanctions imposed to curb its missile and nuclear ambitions.
The currency revaluation last Nov 30 was widely seen as another attempt to crack down on a burgeoning free-market economy. But it backfired disastrously, according to numerous reports, with savings wiped out, prices soaring and food distribution networks disrupted.
“The SPA will likely approve laws and measures aimed to stimulate the economy and improve people’s living standards, which are policy goals announced early this year,” Professor Kim Keun-Sik of Kyungnam University told AFP.
Personnel appointments and steps to deal with the aftershock of the revaluation are also likely to be discussed, he said.
“It is the unshakable resolution and will of Kim Jong-Il to bring about radical changes in improving the people’s standard of living this year..” party newspaper Rodong Sinmun declared this month.
Today’s session will approve the budget and will also likely handle personnel appointments related to the won revaluation, said Kim Yong-Hyun, a professor at Seoul’s Dongguk University.
Authorities reportedly executed a top financial official, Park Nam-Ki, in a desperate attempt to quell public anger.
“The SPA is also likely to endorse legal and institutional adjustments aimed at attracting investment from abroad,” Kim Yong-Hyun said.
China is reportedly arranging a major foreign investment deal to revive its ally’s economy, amid an international effort to coax North Korea back to nuclear disarmament talks which Beijing chairs.
The North has announced a drive for foreign funds, including setting up a state development bank, as it struggles to achieve its goal of becoming a “great, powerful and prosperous nation” by 2012. — AFP