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SEOUL : A gaunt-looking Kim Jong-Il, the reclusive North Korean leader, made a rare televised appearance Wednesday to pay homage to his late father Kim Il-Sung at a national memorial service.
It was only the second time that contemporaneous footage of the 67-year-old has been aired on state television since his reported stroke last August.
Kim limped slightly as he entered Pyongyang Indoor Stadium and took a seat on stage, a video clip seen in Seoul showed.
The film showed the leader with thinning hair when he bowed his head for a brief silent tribute to mark the 15th anniversary of his father's death.
Kim was last shown at an event when he attended the first meeting of the country's new parliament in April.
This year's anniversary comes amid high international tensions over the communist state's missile launches and its May nuclear test.
US and South Korean officials believe the apparently ailing leader is staging a show of strength to bolster his authority as he tries to put in place a succession plan involving his youngest son, Jong-Un.
It also came South Korea's intelligence service were reportedly pointing a finger at Pyongyang for a major cyber attack Tuesday that shut down US and South Korean websites.
On Wednesday Kim visited Pyongyang's Kumsusan Memorial Palace, where the embalmed body of his father lies inside a glass coffin.
He was accompanied by top military officials including defence minister Kim Yong-Chun, the official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) reported.
State media has carried a series of hagiographical reports on Kim Il-Sung's "immortal feats," and his son's achievements in preserving the legacy, in an apparent attempt to bolster support for Jong-Il.
The two Kims are the subject of an all-embracing personality cult. Kim Il-Sung was declared president for eternity after he died of a heart attack on July 8, 1994 at the age of 82.
Documentaries on the late leader are being broadcast on television and in cinemas, KCNA said.
"The films show impressively the great life of the President who had converted the motherland into a country the master of which is the popular masses, always finding himself among the people," it said.
"He willingly took boiled rice mixed with cereals, saying that when the people eat boiled millet, we should take the same food."
At the memorial service, ceremonial head of state Kim Yong-Nam described "Great Leader" Kim Il-Sung as a "peerlessly great man who the Korean people greeted and held in high esteem for the first time in the history of spanning five thousand years."
He described Kim Il-Sung was an "invincible and iron-willed commander who ushered in a new era of the anti-imperialist struggle."
Soldiers, civilians and schoolchildren laid floral baskets before statues of the late Kim in various parts of the country, KCNA said.
An "endless stream" of people was said to have visited a huge bronze statue at Pyongyang's Mansu Hill unveiled in 1972 to mark his 60th birthday.
A remembrance concert was also held at a Pyongyang theatre in "boundless reverence for the peerlessly great man," KCNA said.
- AFP /ls
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