A life for propaganda
The “North Korean Goebbels” is dead
May 8, 2024, 9:20 a.m
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Kim Ki Nam is largely responsible for the personality cult surrounding the three previous North Korean dictators. He has held key positions in propaganda departments since the 1980s. Now North Korea reports the death of the man they also call “Goebbels” in the South.
In North Korea, the regime’s long-time propaganda chief died at the age of 94. Kim Ki Nam passed away on Tuesday, the state news agency KCNA reported. He was recently treated for age-related illnesses and several organ disorders. Head of State Kim Jong Un visited the body in a mourning hall in the capital Pyongyang early on Wednesday and expressed his condolences to the relatives. Kim Ki Nam is scheduled to be buried on Thursday.
The former secretary of the Central Committee of the ruling Workers’ Party “devoted his entire life to the holy struggle to defend and strengthen the ideological purity of our revolution and firmly ensure the steady victory of the socialist cause,” according to KCNA.
Kim Ki Nam was a professor at Kim Il Sung University and editor-in-chief of the state-run newspaper Rodong Sinmun before taking on leadership roles in the Workers’ Party’s propaganda departments since the 1980s.
Kim Ki Nam worked under three dictators
His role as the country’s top propagandist earned him the nickname “North Korean Goebbels” in South Korea, after Nazi Germany’s propaganda minister. Kim Ki Nam was involved in establishing the cult of personality surrounding North Korea’s three dynastic leaders.
From the founding of North Korea in 1948 until 1994, Kim Il-Sung led the country. After his death, his son Kim Jong Il took over the office, who died in 2011 and in turn handed it over to his descendant Kim Jong Un. This leads North Korea to this day. The “North Korean Goebbels” Kim Ki Nam was among seven high-ranking officials who, along with Kim Jong Un, accompanied the late Kim Jong Il’s hearse after his death in 2011.