Kim Jong Il dead at 69

After years of speculation about Kim Jong Il’s declining health, North Korean television has reported that the leader has passed away. He was 69.

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June 29, 2006

North Korean leader Kim Jong Il applauds as he inspects a unit of the Korean People's Army in North Korea, in an undated file photograph released by Korea News Service.

/ Reuters/Korea News Service

A photograph of former North Korean founder Kim Il-Sung hugging his son Kim Jong-il is displayed at the Unification Hall at the West Seoul Life Science High School in Seoul.

Korea News Service / Reuters

North Korean founder Kim Il-sung, his first wife Kim Jong-suk and his son Kim Jong-il, is displayed at the Unification Hall at the West Seoul Life Science High School in Seoul.

/ REUTERS

Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) released this undated photograph of Kim Jong-Il, center, son of North Korea's President Kim Il-Sung and the country's heir-apparent visiting a mine during an "on-the-spot" guidance tour.

/ AFP/GETTY IMAGES

This undated photo released 24 June by Korea News Service and published by North Korean paper No Dong Ilbo shows North Korean leader Kim Jong-Il, second to the right, inspecting cucumbers harvested inside the 770th army base near Nyon Won power plant in Pyonan-Namdo.

KOREA NEWS SERVICE / AFP/GETTY IMAGES

October 1980

Kim Jong Il, right, and his father Kim Il Sung, front, attend a party to celebrate the sixth Korean Worker's Party convention. The title of president was eventually abolished in deference to Kim Il Sung, who died in 1994, leaving Kim Jong Il as effective head of state.

Korean News Service / Agence France-Presse

Jan. 1, 1997

Kim Jong Il is greeted by a schoolchild as he visits the Mangyongdae Revolutionary Academy in Pyongyang.

Reuters / Reuters

Sept. 15, 1997

Kim Jong Il, third from left, supreme commander of the North Korean military, inspects a front-line observation post of the Peoples' Army 287 Unit in an undisclosed location in North Korea. He was formally named head of the ruling party on Oct. 8, 1997, taking one of the formal titles left vacant when his father died.

/ Associated Press/Korea News Service

June 13, 2000

Kim Jong Il, right, and then-South Korean President Kim Dae-jung, left, at the Sunan International Airport in Pyongyang, when Kim visited in an effort to reconcile political differences. The handshake they exchanged was the first between two leaders of the Korean Peninsula since the two sides separated more than 50 years before.

Getty Images / Getty Images

June 15, 2000

South Korean first lady Lee Hee-ho, right, and Kim Jong Il, in green, clap as then-South Korean President Kim Dae-jung, second from left, fills drinks for his entourage at a lunch at Baekhwawon Guesthouse in Pyongyang. The two Korean leaders had concluded a historic three-day summit aimed at mending relations between North and South Korea.

Yonhap / Associated Press

June 14, 2000

Kim Jong Il, right, and then-South Korean President Kim Dae-jung raise their arms before signing a joint declaration at the end of the second day of a three-day summit in Pyongyang. In the aftermath of the summit, Kim Dae-jung was chosen for the Nobel Peace Prize.

Yonhap / Associated Press

Oct. 23, 2000

Kim Jong Il, right, and then-Secretary of State Madeleine Albright at the Pae Kha Hawon Guest House in Pyongyang. Albright, the highest-ranking U.S. official to visit North Korea in 50 years, met with the North Korean leader in an effort to ease tensions between the two nations.

David Guttenfelder / Associated Press

Oct. 23, 2000

Kim Jong Il, left, then Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, center, and an unidentified military official applaud at the May Day Stadium in Pyongyang. Albright was given a repeat performance of a "mass demonstration" that was first held on Oct. 10, 2000, marking the 55th anniversary of the founding of the Korean Workers Party.

Frederic J. Brown / Agence France-Presse

Oct. 24, 2000

Kim Jong Il, left, toasts Albright at a dinner in Pyongyang. Albright's visit in 2000 was part of a coordinated strategy involving Washington and its allies, South Korea and Japan, to end North Korea's isolation and remove the threat of war in one of the world's most volatile regions.

Chien-min Chung / Agence France-Presse

Aug. 23, 2002

Kim Jong Il waves from his car after his meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Vladivostok, Russia. After their talks, Putin said the North Korean leader had displayed a strong desire to renew a direct peace dialogue with rival South Korea.

ITAR-Tass / Agence France-Presse

Aug. 23, 2002

Vladimir Putin, right, greets Kim Jong Il at their meeting in Vladivostok. Kim went to what once was one of Russia's most closed cities in a trip focusing on economic reform.

Alexander Zemlianichenko / Associated Press

Aug. 24, 2002

Kim Jong Il, seen before his departure from Vladivostok.

Vladimir Sayapin / Associated Press

April 15, 2003

Kim Jong Il, center, inspects the Hamhung Disabled Soldiers' Plastic Daily Necessities Factory in Hamhung, north of Pyongyang. Kim paid the visit on the 91st anniversary of the birth of his father, Kim Il Sung.

Korea News Service / Reuters

Sept. 19, 2004

Kim Jong Il, center in sunglasses, inspects agricultural machinery at an exhibition of high-yielding crops in North Korea in this undated photo released Sept. 19, 2004.

Korea News Service / Reuters

Oct. 10, 2005

Kim Jong Il returns a salute as he reviews a military parade in Pyongyang to celebrate the 60th anniversary of the Communist Party.

Korea News Service / Reuters

Jan. 17, 2006

Chinese President Hu Jintao, right, with Kim Jong Il at Beijing's Great Hall of the People. Kim told China's president he was committed to a peaceful resolution of the standoff over North Korea's nuclear ambitions as he wrapped up a weeklong, secrecy-shrouded trip to his last major ally.

Xinhua News Agency, Rao Aimin / AP

April 2006

Kim Jong Il, front row center, with soldiers of Korean People's Army Unit 821 at an undisclosed area in North Korea.

Korea Central News Agency via Korea News Service / AP

Kim Jong Nam, front right, the son of Kim Jong Il, front left, sits beside his father in a photo thought to have been taken around 1981. At rear is Sung Hae Rang, back left, the sister of Kim Jong Nam's mother, and her two children, neither of whom are named.

Joong Ang Ilbo / Reuters

Aug. 12, 2000

Kim Jong Il downs a drink during a toast with a South Korean media representative, Kum Chang Tae, in Pyongyang.

Yonhap / Associated Press

June 8, 2007

Kim Jong Il inspects the Sinam cooperative farm in Ryongchon county in North Korea in an undated photo released on June 8, 2007.

Korea News Service / Reuters

Oct. 2, 2007

Then-South Korean President Roh Moo-hyun, right, greets Kim Jong Il, left, in Pyongyang as the two countries began their second summit since the Korean Peninsula's division after World War II.

Yonhap / AP

Oct. 2, 2007

South Koreans read newspapers in downtown Seoul reporting on the peace summit between the two Koreas in Pyongyang. Upon the arrival of then-South Korean President Roh Moo-hyun, Kim Jong Il orchestrated cheers from a crowd of thousands for the pending talks.

Lee Jin-man / AP

Aug. 5, 2008

South Korean war veterans burn a portrait of Kim Jong Il during a rally to welcome President George W. Bush to Seoul during Bush's tour of Asia, before his appearance at the 2008 Summer Olympic Games in Beijing.

Ahn Young-joon / AP

Aug. 6, 2008

Kim Jong Il, right, visits a military unit at an undisclosed location in North Korea in a photo released on Aug. 6, 2008.

KCNA / Reuters

Oct. 11, 2008

A man in Seoul watches a TV program showing North Korean leader Kim Jong Il's inspection of a female military unit in North Korea. It was North Korea first release in nearly two months of pictures of Kim.

Lee Jin-Man / AP

Oct. 11, 2008

In an undated photo released by the Korean Central News Agency via the Korea News Service in Tokyo on Oct. 11, 2008, North Korean leader Kim Jong Il accompanies soldiers on a visit to a military unit in an unknown location of North Korea. The photo, along with several video frame grabs, was the first of Kim released in two months and showed him in a setting very similar to photographs from August.

Korean Central News Agency via Korea News Service / Associated Press

North Korean leader Kim Jong-il (R) looks at his youngest son Kim Jong-un as they watch a parade to commemorate the 65th anniversary of founding of the Workers' Party of Korea in Pyongyang in this October 10, 2010 file photograph. North Korean leader Kim Jong-il died on December 17, 2011 state television reported on December 19, 2011. An announcer said he died of physical and mental over-work. REUTERS/Petar Kujundzic/Files (NORTH KOREA - Tags: POLITICS OBITUARY TPX IMAGES OF THE DAY)

PETAR KUJUNDZIC / REUTERS

Sept. 9, 2011

North Korean leader Kim Jong-Il, right, and his son Kim Jong Un, at second left, salute as they watch soldiers attending a military parade in the Kim Il Sung square in Pyongyang, marking the 63rd anniversary of the state's founding.

KCNA / REUTERS

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