Jang Song-thaek reportedly being dragged out from his chair by two police officials during a meeting in Pyongyang, North Korea. Photograph: Yonhap/AFP/Getty Images
The North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has overseen the ousting of his previously powerful uncle Jang Song-thaek for crimes including faction-building and “dissolute and depraved” behaviour involving drug use, womanising and gambling, North Korean media has announced.
The unprecedented and lengthy dispatch from the state news agency KCNA followed claims of the purge last week by South Korean legislators briefed by Seoul’s spy agency.
Less than two years since becoming leader, Kim has made sweeping changes to the power apparatus in North Korea. Another key figure who had been seen as a mentor – Ri Yong Ho, then military chief – was removed due to “ill health” last year.
But the toppling of Jang is remarkable because he is being attacked so publicly and aggressively, and because of his family ties. The North Korean state broadcaster showed a photograph of him being forcibly removed from the meeting that announced his fate by two uniformed men.
Hopefully he won't take a mortar round to teeth has happened to two former government officials accused of similar crimes last August. Or have him and his entire family sent to North Korea's prison camps.
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