Overview
- State media said Kim dismissed Vice Premier Yang Sung-ho during the Jan. 19 inauguration of the first-stage modernization at the Ryongsong Machine Complex in South Hamgyong Province.
- KCNA reported the project faced delays, “not a little” economic loss and roughly 60 implementation problems, with officials accused of passivity, buck-passing and incompetence.
- Kim ordered a team of experts to conduct an overall review and set next-stage modernization tasks for the machine-building sector.
- Yang, a former machinery industry minister who oversaw the machinery sector and serves as an alternate Politburo member, has not yet been replaced.
- Analysts highlighted Ryongsong’s industrial importance—estimated at about 16% of national machinery output—and viewed the public rebuke as a warning to cadres ahead of the party congress.