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Norks say Kimmie is 'recovered', trust them on that
SEOUL (Reuters) - North Korea stepped up its campaign to prove leader Kim Jong-il is well and in control by showing him looking at an electronic copy of a newspaper dated Tuesday in a series of photos released through its official media.

U.S. and South Korean officials have said Kim, 66, suffered a stroke in August, raising questions about leadership in Asia's only communist dynasty and who was making decisions about the North's nuclear program. Despite re-emerging in early October in official media reports about making public appearances and seen in unndated photographs, there had been no definite and up-to-date image that showed the reclusive leader in good health.

In the series of photographs released by KCNA news agency, Kim is seen inspecting a library in the northern Jagang province and looking at a computer monitor displaying an electronic copy of the official Rodong Sinmun newspaper dated December 16. Kim, wearing a heavy winter coat, a fur hat and ski gloves indoors, is shown listening grim-faced to briefings by local officials as he toured the Jagang provincial information center.

"Reading information through a computer network is not only economical but an effective method of enabling a lot of people to read anything in any place, he noted, underscoring the need to expand the computer network," KCNA said.
As opposed to feeding the people ...
The front page of the Rodong Sinmun carried the headline story about a visiting Egyptian delegation of Orascom Telecom officials presenting a gift to Kim. Orascom launched a mobile telephone service in the North on Monday, a market seen at best as strictly limited in commercial viability because the authorities are unlikely to allow the general public to have access to telecommunication networks.
Maybe that's because they're a bunch of communists?
Last week, a French doctor who is thought to have treated Kim was quoted in French newspaper Le Figaro as saying the leader had suffered a stroke but did not undergo surgery and is now better.
Posted by: Steve White 2008-12-17
http://www.rantburg.com/poparticle.php?ID=257417