Kim Jong-un's uncle still alive, says Rodman

Want China Times, Staff Reporter 2014-05-07

Rodman talks to Kim Jong-un in Pyongyang in January during the
basketball player's fourth visit to North Korea. (Photo/Xinhua)

Retired NBA star Dennis Rodman said that Jang Sung-taek, the uncle and close adviser of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un who is understood to have been executed on Dec. 13, 2013 according to North Korean state media, stood behind him when he visited the reclusive country in January, reports the website of China's nationalistic Global Times tabloid.

North Korea's official news agency KCNA reported in December last year that Jang, who was married to Kim Jong-un's aunt, was removed from all posts, expelled from the Workers' Party of Korea and executed for "anti-Party and counterrevolutionary crimes."

The former basketball star in an nterview with American magazine DuJour denied however that Jang is dead. "You could say anything here about North Korea and people would believe it," Rodman claimed.

Rodman also said Kim's ex-girlfriend Hyon Song-wol, a singer with the Unhasu Orchestra who was said to have been executed by firing squad, and Jang were standing right behind him on his last visit to the country.

He said that the man he saw was Jang, even after DuJour reminded him that the execution had been confirmed by the North Korean government. Rodman said Kim wanted to talk to US president Barack Obama. The North Korean leader also said a nuclear weapon is the only way for the country to defend itself, though Rodman told the interviewer that Kim had said he doesn't want to bomb anybody. "He loves Americans," the NBA hall-of-famer said.

Rodman initially avoided media after his latest controversial visit to the communist country this year, during which he appeared to be under a greater amount of stress than on his previous visits.

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