When North Korean leader Kim Jong Un mysteriously disappeared from public view for three weeks last month, triggering widespread rumors about his health, many international observers speculated about what could come next. His possible demise might lead to a contested succession that sparked domestic instability and the proliferation of North Korea’s stockpiles of nuclear weapons and fissile material. Kim’s reemergence on May 2, at the opening of a fertilizer plant in the city of Sunchon, has taken succession concerns off the table for now. But it is time to worry once again about North Korea’s development of its nuclear and […]
