Kim Jong Il, born in 1942, leader of North Korea (1994- ). Kim Jong Il succeeded his father, Kim Il Sung, who had ruled North Korea since 1948.

Kim Jong Il was born in Siberia near Khabarovsk, in what was then the Soviet Union near the border with Manchuria. During World War II (1939-1945) Kim’s father led a Communist guerrilla group fighting against Japanese forces in Manchuria. In 1945 Kim’s family returned to Korea, with his father being honored as a war hero. Kim Il Sung became premier of North Korea in 1948, after Korea was divided into two countries; a year later he became the top leader of North Korea’s Communist party, the Korean Workers’ Party (KWP). During the Korean War (1950-1953) Kim’s father placed him in safety in Northeast China. Kim attended Kim Il Sung University from 1960 to 1964, earning a degree in political economics, before going to work at the headquarters of the KWP.

In 1973 Kim was elected party secretary in charge of organization and propaganda. He was given high ranking in the Politburo, the party's principal policymaking body, and achieved membership on the Central People’s Committee in 1980. From then on the state-controlled media increasingly referred to him as “Dear Leader.” In 1990 he was appointed to his father’s first state post as first vice chairman of the National Defense Commission. The following year he was named supreme commander of the Korean People's Army, a post held by his father since 1948. He was appointed to the rank of marshal, with his father as grand marshal, in 1992.

Prior to his death on July 8, 1994, Kim Il Sung officially designated his son as his successor, effecting the first hereditary transfer of power in a Communist state. After his death, North Korea observed an official mourning period that lasted for three years. During this period, Kim Jong Il was the country’s de facto leader. In October 1997 he was appointed general secretary of the KWP, effectively assuming formal leadership of the country. The following year North Korea revised its constitution to recognize the chair of the National Defense Commission, a post held by Kim Jong Il, as the country’s “highest office.”