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North Korea has never announced a successor to Kim Jong Un. But according to a new Associated Press report, most of the people who know the country best — the defectors who escaped it — now believe they know who it will be: his 13-year-old daughter, Kim Ju Ae. Eight of the 11 defectors interviewed by the AP shared that view, and South Korea's spy agency agrees. The question is no longer whether she is being prepared. It is whether a teenage girl can inherit the world's most secretive nuclear-armed dynasty.
What we actually know about her
Remarkably little, which is itself part of the story. She is reportedly about 13 years old and named Kim Ju Ae, and she first appeared in public in late 2022, at a missile launch beside her father. Since then she has made dozens of public appearances, all of them with her father, at big events like weapons tests, military parades and factory visits. Her most recent appearance came on October 29, 2026, at a ceremony exhibiting drones in the Wonsan-Kalma coastal tourist area, where she stood between Kim and her mother, Ri Sol Ju. North Korean state media has given her prominent billing throughout, and her repeated presence at the regime's most sensitive showcases has led to speculation for four years now that she is being groomed as her father's heir.
Why defectors think she is the heir
The defectors' reasoning is about protocol, not personality. "During her visits to missile launch sites and factories, the way senior North Korean officials treat Kim Ju Ae involves protocols reserved for a successor, not the ones simply for a daughter of Kim Jong Un," said Tae Yongho, a former minister at North Korea's Embassy in London who defected to South Korea in 2016. "They are repeating the same protocol and treatment they provided for Kim Jong Un." Kang Mi-Jin, a defector who runs a company analysing North Korea's economy, said her contacts inside the country told her over smuggled phones that they think Kim Ju Ae is in line to succeed her father. Jung Gwang-il, a defector who specialises in smuggling outside information into North Korea, said the North Koreans he meets in Chinese border towns hold the same belief. The pattern, in their telling, matches the choreography that preceded Kim Jong Un's own rise.
The doubts — and why they matter
Not everyone agrees. Three of the 11 defectors interviewed by the AP disagreed, and much of the scepticism stems from her being female in a deeply patriarchal system. South Korean officials believe Kim has a younger sibling whose gender has not been confirmed. "My contacts in North Korea say it would be nonsensical to revere that little girl as their supreme leader," said Lee Si-young, a defector who heads the Seoul-based Free North Korea Radio station. Crucially, nothing has been officially announced: no title, no designation, no public statement naming her as successor. What exists is a four-year pattern of appearances, the judgement of South Korea's intelligence service, and the view of most defectors — strong signals, but not confirmation.
Whoever succeeds Kim Jong Un, 42, will face an extraordinary challenge: governing an impoverished, nuclear-armed nation of 26 million people who live under strict surveillance and have no say in the selection of their future leader. Analysts and defectors agree the public will passively accept a third dynastic succession, at least in public. Whether the girl at the centre of it is ready — and whether the regime's old guard would accept a teenage girl as supreme leader — is the question North Korea watchers will be asking for years. For now, the choreography points one way, and the announcement, if it ever comes, will be the moment the speculation ends. For the wider security picture, see our reports on Europe joining the Ukraine peace talks in Abu Dhabi and Iran's two-day ultimatum to the United States. And for why governments everywhere are suddenly telling citizens to prepare, see our explainer on the global stockpiling wave.
Sources: The New Indian Express (AP), Delmarva Public Media (AP).