China Reportedly Has Provided Covid-19 Vaccines For Kim Jong-un And His Family

JAKARTA - China is reported to have given the COVID-19 vaccine to supreme leader Kim Jong-un and his family. This was conveyed by a United States (US) analyst, citing two unnamed Japanese intelligence sources.

Launching Reuters on Tuesday, December 1, an expert from North Korea named Harry Kazianis who is active at the Center for the National Interest, a think tank in the US, said Kim Jong-un and his family and several senior North Korean officials had been vaccinated. However, it is not clear which companies are supplying the vaccines and whether they are safe.

"Kim Jong-un and several other high-ranking officials in the family and leadership network have been vaccinated for the coronavirus in the past two to three weeks thanks to a vaccine candidate provided by the Chinese government," Kazianis said in an article.

Quoting US medical scientist Peter J. Hotez, he said at least three Chinese companies were developing a vaccine for COVID-19. These vaccines include Sinovac Biotech Ltd, CanSinoBio and Sinophram Group.

Sinophram said his vaccine candidate has been used by nearly a million people in China. Even so, no company is known to publicly launch a phase 3 clinical trial of their experimental COVID-19 drug.

North Korea has not confirmed any cases of COVID-19 in its country. But South Korea's (South Korea) National Intelligence Service (NIS) said an outbreak there could not be ruled out because the country had trade and people-to-people exchanges with China before the borders of the two countries closed.

North Korea is often proud that there are no COVID-19 cases in the country. However, the truth of North Korea's claims has not been proven. On that basis, North Korea cannot take it easy.

Microsoft had said two groups of North Korean hackers had tried to break into vaccine development networks in many countries, without specifying the target companies. Sources said hackers were also snooping on data from British vaccine maker AstraZeneca.

In addition, Kim Jong-un is also known to be pushing for the prevention of the COVID-19 pandemic by tightening the country's almost impassable borders. Kim Jong-un also cut off nearly all trade with China, even allegedly executing customs officials for failing to properly handle imported goods.

China exported just $ 253,000 worth of goods to North Korea in October. That figure fell 99 percent from September to October, according to data published by China's customs administration.

North Korea basically does not significantly import goods from other countries. Before major UN sanctions were imposed as penalties for the nuclear weapons program in 2016 and 2017, China accounted for more than 90 percent of North Korea's foreign trade.