PRESENTATION OUTLINE
Early Life
Born February 16, 1941 in a secret camp on Mount Paekdu along the Chinese border, in Samjiyon County, Ryanggang Province, in the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (North Korea).
Education
Kim Jong Il completed his general education between September 1950 and August 1960 in Pyongyang, the current capital city of North Korea.Kim Jong Il graduated from Namsan Higher Middle School in 1960 and enrolled the same year in Kim Il Sung University. He majored in Marxist political economy and minored in philosophy and military science.
Rise to power
Kim Jong Il joined the Workers' Party, the official ruling party of North Korea, in July 1961.
Kim Jong Il began his rise through the ranks of the Korean Workers' Party. The 1960s were a time of high tension between many Communist countries.
Continued..
Between 1971 and 1980, Kim Jong Il was appointed to increasingly important positions in the Korean Workers' Party. During this time, he instituted policies to bring party officials closer to the people by forcing bureaucrats to work among subordinates for one month a year. Kim Jong Il was hailed in the North Korean media as the "fearless leader" and "the great successor to the revolutionary cause." His portraits appeared in public buildings along with his father's.
Maintained power
Kim also maintained power through a personality cult that portrayed his father Kim Il Sung as the country’s god-like “Great Leader.” After his father died in 1994, Kim Jong Il succeeded him and acquired the title “Dear Leader.”
Fall from Power
Kim Jong Il who died on Dec. 17 at the age of 69, successfully held power for more than 17 years by imposing a climate of fear and a “military first” policy that favored the country’s armed forces. After death his,his son,Kim Jong Un took over.
Legacy
Kim Jong-il's grisly signature achievement was to turn his country into an acknowledged nuclear power, conducting two bomb tests in 2006 and 2009. Kim Jong-Il’s legacy includes the fate of the tens of thousands who have died in the kwanliso camps for alleged enemies of the state, where today an estimated 200,000 North Koreans continue to work and die in conditions of near starvation and brutal abuse.
