Chairman Kim Jong Il (1942-2011) of the National Defence Commission of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea was a man with a great, ennobling sense of humanity.
It is well known that he, despite his failing health during the last years of his life, was always on tour for field guidance to provide the people with happier life until he died on a train bound for on-site guidance.
There are a lot of anecdotes about his travels for the good of the people, which are helpful in seeing his ennobling sense of humanity.
In March 2000 Kim Jong Il gave on-site guidance at a farm in Taehongdan County in the northern alpine region of the country. On a visit to a village, he acquainted himself with the living conditions of the ex-soldiers there who had volunteered to work at the local farm after their military service. There, he called on a newly-married couple at their home.
Hearing from an official that the hostess was pregnant, Kim Jong Il said it was happy news, and asked how many of the wives of the ex-soldiers were going to have a baby sooner or later. Then, he warmly asked the couple to tell him whatever difficulties they had in life.
The hostess, attracted by his warm heart, asked the Chairman to name her baby to be born soon. Giving a hearty laugh, Kim Jong Il accepted her request pleasantly.
That evening he gave a name as she had asked. Then he took an effective measure for the Pyongyang Maternity Hospital to dispatch a mobile medical team to Taehongdan County to offer good service to expecting wives of the ex-servicemen.
On a visit to the Ryongyang Mine in May 2009, Kim Jong Il went as deep as a cutting face to encourage the workers there.
That day he happened to meet a woman who had been working at the mine as an excavator operator for 14 years since she voluntarily left her home in Pyongyang to work there. Seeing her, Kim Jong Il immediately noticed her sallow face. After his return, he sent a woman official of the Central Committee of the Workers’ Party of Korea to the mine to learn about her condition.
Hearing the report that she had most probably contracted an incurable disease, he, quite worried, instructed that she should be rushed to the Pyongyang Maternity Hospital for confirmation of her illness and the best possible treatment.
Thus, the woman was put to an all-round examination at the hospital, received intensive treatment for two months under the great concern of the medical staff, and finally got full well.
The last document he signed in his lifetime was related to the supply of fish to the people on the occasion of the New Year of 2012. It is no accidental that the Korean people, bidding their last farewell to the Chairman after his death, lamented as bitterly as they would do over the loss of their own parents, and some even tried to block the way ahead of the bier car out of their deep sorrow.
Kim Jong Il’s sense of humanity went beyond national boundaries and nationalities.
A huge number of ordinary people from around the world received warm care from him, including Jindallae of Palestine, the Novichenkos of Russia, and Govind Narain Sribastaba of India. They unanimously said that Kim Jong Il was a man with a great, ennobling sense of humanity, who showed warm, genuine care for whoever his acquaintance was.
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