North Koreans are in mourning after the announcement of North Korean leader Kim Jong-iI’s death. State media proclaim the 69 year old died of heart failure, following a heart attack on Saturday at 08:30 local time.

A period of national mourning will be held from the date of Kim’s death to December 29. The funeral is said to be held in Pyongyang on December 28.

“We should increase the country’s military capability in every way to reliably safeguard the Korean socialist system and the gains of revolution,” the National Funeral Committee said.

Korean news agency, KCNA, has stated that millions of North Korean citizens are in deep despair over their leaders death.

They reported “All party members, military men and the public should faithfully follow the leadership of comrade Kim Jong-un and protect and further strengthen the unified front of the party, military and the public.”

South Korean President, Lee Myung-bak put all members of South Korea’s military on emergency alert. South Korean news agency Yonhap reported that North Korea tested an unspecified number of short-range missiles on Monday morning.

Following an emergency Cabinet meeting Monday, Lee asked South Koreans to go about their normal business. “For the sake of the future of the Republic of Korea, peace and stability on the Korean Peninsula is more important than anything else. It should not be threatened by what has happened,” he said.

Kim Young-mok, South Korean consul in New York, said that Seoul’s top priority is to avoid “anything troublesome. I don’t think that North Korea can afford some provocation at this point, but we must make sure that everything is OK,” he said.

Kim Jong-il came into power following the death of his father in 1994. The following year, a three year famine struck the country for three years, killing more than 2 million people.

Kim reacted to the famine by commencing some limited economic reforms, including the jangmadang, or private markets for food and daily necessities that the state-run economy could no longer sufficiently provide. In 2000 he also stepped up diplomatic engagement, leading to the first inter-Korean summit.

Former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, Bill Richardson spoke about his reaction to the news. “North Korea, the peninsula is a tinderbox. The issue is, will there be stability in the North Korean leadership? Will they continue their recent efforts of engaging South Korea and the United States over food aid, over nuclear talks?”

The day following Kim’s funeral a separate “national meeting of mourning” will take place, with all North Koreans instructed to pay a three-minute silent tribute to Mr. Kim.

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The North Korea Central News Agency (KCNA) reported the “Dear Leader” Kim Jong-Il died on Saturday December 17 due to physical and mental overwork.

The 69-year-old North Korean Leader was on a train on his way to a “field guidance tour” to farms, factories and to the army when he suffered a heart attack that has been fatal to him. A distraught black dressed broadcaster announced his death and said that despite he was treated with “every possible first-aid measure” he couldn’t be saved.

The KCNA reported North Koreans were “writhing in pain”  for their leader’s death and the Chinese state television showed people’s tearful reaction to the news in the city of Pyongyang.

Kim Jong-Il had come to power in 1994, when his father, Kim Il-Sung, died struck down by a heart attack at the age of 82, and he ruled the country for 17 years. In 1974, he had been officially named his father’s heir and since the 80’s the Korean government, ruled by the elder Kim, began building a personality cult around him and he was acclaimed as “the great successor to the revolutionary cause”.

Under his long rule, North Korea was closed off to outside influences and led through a devastating famine that contributed to the death of millions of people and for which he also sought international aid. The country has been termed as a totalitarian Stalinist dictatorship by several outside organizations, including Freedom House and Amnesty International, and it has also been described as one of the lowest-ranking human rights records of any country in the world. According to Human Rights Watch, the country’s government under Kim Jong-Il was “among the world’s most repressive governments” and North Koreans are “some of the world’s most brutalized people” given that civil liberties and fundamental rights are not guaranteed and strongly restricted. Defectors also reported about tortures, deportation to internment and concentration camps, executions, forced labour, rapes, murders, starvation, and forced abortions and prostitution.

However, it is very hard to have a clear and complete picture of the country’s  actual situation because the North Korean government strictly controls the access of foreigners, the media, and the people’s lives and relations.

Kim Jong-Il’s funeral will be held on December 28, but the national mourning period will last until December 29. The KNCN said he will buried next to his father Kim Il-Sung, the “Eternal President”.

Kim Jong-un, the third and youngest son of Kim Jong-Il who started his carreer as Daejang – the equivalent of four-star general – , has been designed as the Great Successor” by the KCNA, which lauded him as “the outstanding leader of our party, army and people”.

The agency also said the country and the people “must faithfully revere respectable comrade Kim Jong-un. At the leadership of comrade Kim Jong-un, we have to change sadness to strength and courage and overcome today’s difficulties” and find comfort in the “absolute surety that the leadership of Comrade Kim Jong-un will lead and succeed the great task of revolutionary enterprise”.

Kim Jong-un, unlike his father who had 20 years as official heir, became successor by taking on official titles only last year and doesn’t have any political experience. He takes over a heavy inheritance and it has to be seen whether and how he will be able to manage being the leader of the most isolated country of the world. Meanwhile, many countries concern about the future steps of the new North Korea’s leader.

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