| Death and Funeral of Kim Il-sung | |
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Official portrait of Kim Il-sung |
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| Participants | Kim Jong-il and North Korean military, government and Korean Workers' Party elites |
| Location | Pyongyang, North Korea |
| Date | 8 July 1994 - 17 July 1994 |
Kim Il-sung died on July 8, 1994 at age 82. North Korea did not report the death for more than 34 hours after it occured. An official mourning period was declared from July 8-17, during which all forms of amusement and dancing were prohibited.
Pyongyang radio said that the Kim had succumbed to complications arising from a stroke as a result of psychological stress. He had been receiving treatment for some time for the hardening of arteries in his heart.
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Kim Jong-il was named chairman of the funeral committee, which planned and managed the funeral. The committee also included Defense Minister O Jin-u and Vice President Kim Yong-ju, who was Kim Il-sung's younger brother. Its makeup is clearly intended to send a signal of stability and continuity in a nation wracked with grief, or at least the public display of grief.[6]
The funeral committee released communique regrading the funeral
The State Funeral Committee publishes the following decision for the whole party, all the people and the entire army to express the deepest condolences over the death of the great leader Comrade Kim Il-sung and mourn him with the feelings of deep reverence:
- The coffin of the respected leader Comrade Kim Il-sung will be laid in state at the Kumsusan Assembly Hall.
- The period from 8th July to 17th July 1994, is set as the mourning period for the respected leader Comrade Kim Il-sung. The mourners will visit the bier from 11th July to 16th July 1994.
- The mourning service for the last parting with the respected leader Comrade Kim Il-sung will be held solemnly in Pyongyang, the capital of revolution, on 17th July 1994.
- At the time of the mourning service in Pyongyang, artillery salute will be fired in Pyongyang and provincial seats and the entire people across the country will observe a three-minute silence and all locomotives and ships sound whistles all at once in memory of the respected leader Comrade Kim Il-sung.
- During the mourning period, memorial services will be held at all the organs and enterprises throughout the country and memorial services be held in all provinces, cities and counties while the memorial service is held in Pyongyang.
- During the mourning period, organs and enterprises will hang the flag at half-mast, and all songs and dances, games and amusement will be banned.
- Foreign mourning delegations will not be received.
— Korean Central News Agency, 8 July 1994[7]
State funeral was held on July 17 and included the observance of three minutes of silence throughout the country.[8] After the closed-door funeral, Kim Jong-il was seen in the footage leaving the hall and standing on a dais sheathed in red, surveying the scene alongside top party and military officials as the black Lincoln Continental bearing his father's body departs the palace grounds to a military salute.
Kim Jong Il bowed repeatedly in front of his father's coffin, before it was driven on the back of a black limousine through the main streets of Pyongyang. It was preceded by an enormous portrait of the dead man mounted on another car and an arrow-like formation of several dozen motorbikes. A fleet of black Mercedes followed the cortege, hiding the most privileged mourners.