Name   Jon Hui-jong Sex   Male Date of Birth   March 5, 1930 Place of Birth   Kangwon Province Posts Held Protocol secretary to Kim Jong-il, cadre of the Korean Workers’ Party’s Central Committee Claim to Fame Diplomat, protocol officer Education Foreign Language College (Pyongyang) Profile Jon Hui-jong has served as a high-ranking protocol officer in summit-level diplomacy. During the historic inter-Korean summit in 2000, he greeted then South President Kim Dae-jung at Pyongyang’s Sunan Airport. Joining the Foreign Ministry in the 1950s, Jon was appointed acting ambassador to Cambodia in 1968 and envoy to Zaire in 1973. In 1980, the Central Committee of the Korean Workers’ Party made him a cadre. After taking over as the committee’s international relations director in 1982, he accompanied then leader Kim Il-sung on visits to China, Russia and Eastern Europe. In 1991, Jon managed international relations at Kumsusan Assembly Hall, which turned into Kim Il-sung’s mausoleum after his death in 1994. Jon handled the receptions of top officials and foreigners who came to pay their last respects to Kim. Since 2000, Jon has served as the personal protocol secretary of incumbent North Korean leader Kim Jong-il and gone with him on trips to China and Russia. From 2002 to 2004, Jon was ambassador to Egypt. Jon and his wife have a son and a daughter. His son Yong-jin has followed in his father’s diplomatic footsteps by graduating from Pyongyang’s University of International Affairs and working as a section leader for French affairs at the Foreign Ministry. He was also once a secretary in the North Korean Embassy in France.

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