Kim not to be embalmed

North Korean leader Kim Jong-il could be denied the status of demigod and have to settle for demagogue.

North Korean leader Kim Jong-il could be denied the status of demigod and have to settle for demagogue.

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Speculation about the younger Kim’s body, now lying in state at a mausoleum in the capital, Pyongyang, is focusing on whether he will be buried, as some reports suggest, or granted a perpetual presence similar to the mummified form of his father, North Korea’s founder Kim Il-sung. After Kim Il-sung’s death in July 1994, his corpse was handed to visiting embalmers from the centre for biological structures in Moscow, who spent almost a year preparing it for display.

The Russian news agency Itar-Tass has quoted North Korean media as saying that the younger Kim would be buried on December 28 and laid to rest in the mausoleum next to his father.