Like father, like daughter. From North Korea, from the official media of Pyongyang, new shots portraying him are going around the world Kim Jong-un with his daughter Ju-ae dressed almost identically: same leather jacket, strictly black. And, at a military parade, next to each other.
For observers it is another signal that suggests she is the one chosen for successionher father’s ‘heir’ at the helm of the country, future leader. Kim Ju-ae appears in the photos released at the conclusion of the Workers’ Party Congress. Kim’s wife, Ri Sol-ju, is also there.
For Lim Eul-Chul, an expert on North Korean politics quoted by the AFP agency, the leather jacket is much more than a trend. “In the political symbolism of North Korea, this presence has weight” because “it is linked to the image of the leader as the supreme guarantor of national security and future prosperity” and since “this same symbolic garment is worn by his daughter, it is difficult to be a coincidence”.
“Kim wants to make her his successor“, also notes Koh Yu-hwan, professor emeritus of Dongguk University in Seoul, quoted by the Financial Times, inviting us to look at “recent public appointments”, with father and daughter together, and observing how Ju-ae is “treated as the second most important person”.
Kim Yeoul-soo of the Korea Institute for Military Affairs talks about a long-term project, explaining to the FT how Kim still has to work hard to make the North Koreans “accept” a woman as their leader. And, he notes, all “could be revealed” at the next Workers’ Party Congress “when she is 18”.
It was November 2022 when the official North Korean media released images of Kim Ju-ae for the first time. Since then he has accompanied the North Korean leader to many official appointments, including missile tests, and was at his side during the trip to China in recent months. In January, news broke of Kim’s daughter’s first known visit to the family mausoleum in Pyongyang. Images published by official North Korean media showed her between her father and mother at the Kumsusan Sun Palace.
North Korean leader Kim Jong Un walks into Kim Il Sung Square with his daughter, presumed to be named Kim Ju-Ae, for the military parade marking the conclusion of the Ninth Party Congress on Wednesday night.
Video: KCTV (Feb. 26, 2026) pic.twitter.com/mLrXlSek8b
— NK NEWS (@nknewsorg) February 26, 2026
In mid-February, South Korean lawmakers reported an intelligence assessment from Seoul that in North Korea the day of Kim Ju-ae’s official nomination as future leader seems to be approaching. And in recent days the South Korean newspaper The Chosun Daily, citing government sources, wrote that according to Seoul intelligence, Kim’s daughter is already working as “general director for missiles”. But over the years there have always been few details about her. She is believed to have been born in 2013 and it has recently emerged that her real name may be “Kim Ju-hae”.