Kim Jong-Un’s health remains unclear despite reports

[UltraVid id=34 ]well a new report out this morning not yet confirmed by Fox News but our correspondents are working on it says that China has now sent a team of medical experts over to North Korea to take a look at Kim jong-un this comes as the North Korean leaders health remains unclear for more insight we’re joined now by Bruce clinger he’s a senior research fellow for Northeast Asia over at the Heritage Foundation Bruce thanks for joining us we’re seeing everything now bubbling up in terms of foreign reporting from Kim Jong on is totally fine recovered well from his surgery in mid-april – he’s actually in a vegetative state now verging on death based on what is known publicly and based on what you know about the regime what’s your best guess as to where he actually is well quite simply we don’t know as you point out we’ve had rumors everything from he’s dead he’s brain dead the US intelligence saying that he’s was seen walking around the port city of once on several days ago and that he may have evacuated himself to the once on simply to avoid being infected by kovat the Chinese medical team may be there to deal with Cova door if Kim has Cova door others around him so we’ve had initial reports which were downplayed by US South Korean and Chinese officials but then we’ve seen this recent spate of humor rumors and we really don’t know what’s going on there so we do know that he is 30 well it is believed estimated that he is 36 years old because the government never confirms his real age we also know from Western reporting and Western intelligence that he is in bad health he has respiratory problems heart problems we know he had some kind of cardiac surgery in in April tell us why at this moment right it’s the North Korean leader being in bad health potentially even passing is something that the you know the US should care about that should grip our national attention amid this coronavirus pandemic seems like there’s a whole lot of other things to worry about well as was the case when his father passed away there’s no formal succession plan in the North Korean Constitution we don’t know if they have something behind the scenes so right now all of us are speculating who the next leader might be there’s not an obvious choice as when his father died and Kim jong-un had been groomed for about three years and anointed as the next leader we’re speculating that his sister may be the next leader up until a few years ago everyone would have thought that a strict Confucian Korean culture wouldn’t allow a woman leader but in the last couple years she’s gained power she’s gained authority and we’ve seen her coming out of the shadows really for the in the last couple years there’s a uncle of Kim jong-un but he’s been really exiled for about three decades in Eastern Europe serving as ambassador to different countries but he recently came back so there’s always concern when you have a nuclear weapons state if you don’t know who the next leader is it could be a smooth transition or it could be a power struggle where everyone’s trying to grab the the ring of power and then who has control of the nuclear weapons and the military so it will be of great concern if Kim dies without some formal succession plan are you worried about state collapse Fox News spoke to administration officials earlier in the week who said you know worst case scenario that accompanies Kim Jong on death is state collapse and we see huge numbers of people starving facing starvation we see North Koreans fleeing North Korea crying across the Chinese border creating a refugee crisis does that square with what you foresee or worried about there are a lot of worst-case scenarios if there is a regime collapse and a struggle for power unknown actions by military factions warring against each other there’s concern that there could be an explosion in the sense of North Korea lashing out against its neighbors or an implosion with the the regime collapse and instability that said you know we were equally concerned during the two previous successions of the father the grandfather when they passed away and the system worked there was a maintaining of stability so I think it’s more likely the regime will maintain itself Bruce sorry to jump in there we’re coming up against a heart break so we’re gonna have to say thank you we’ll talk to you soon great thank you