O Il-jong ( ko, 오일정, context=north, born 1954) is a North Korean politician and three-star general () of the Korean People's Army.

Biography

O Il-jong was born in 1954 in

Pyongyang Pyongyang (, , ) is the capital and largest city of North Korea, where it is known as the "Capital of the Revolution". Pyongyang is located on the Taedong River about upstream from its mouth on the Yellow Sea. According to the 2008 populatio ...

. A graduate of economics at the Kim Il-sung University and Kim Il-sung Military University (he graduated from the Academy only in the 90s). He is the son of

O Jin-u O Jin-u (March 8, 1917 – February 25, 1995) was a North Korean general and politician. He served with Kim Il-sung's partisan unit and eventually rose through the ranks of the North Korean Army. He distinguished himself during the Korean War an ...

, the Minister of the Defense of the North Korea who died in 1995, who for years was one of Kim Il-sung's closest associates and one of the most important figures in the North Korean political system. In the 1980s, O Il-jong worked in diplomacy, he was the military attaché of the DPRK embassy in Egypt. Then, from 1985, he worked at a state-owned foreign trade company. In 1989 he became the commander of the regiment and then a brigade. He received the general nomination for the rank of major-general () in April 1992. From November 1994 he was the commander of the 26th Division in the 4th Corps of the Korean People's Army. During the 3rd Conference of the Workers' Party of Korea on September 28, 2010, he was appointed director of the Military Department of the Central Committee of the Workers' Party of Korea, replacing ), was promoted to a two-star Major-General, and was also a member of the Central Committee for the first time. In April 2011 he was promoted to the rank of colonel general. After the death of

Kim Jong-il Kim Jong-il (; ; ; born Yuri Irsenovich Kim;, 16 February 1941 – 17 December 2011) was a North Korean politician who was the second supreme leader of North Korea from 1994 to 2011. He led North Korea from the 1994 death of his father Kim ...

in December 2011, O Il-jong found himself on the high, 40th place in the 232-person Funeral Committee. It was reported in January 2017, that O Il-jong along with his two other brothers who are O Il-hun and O Il-su had been purged by

Kim Jong-un Kim Jong-un (; , ; born 8 January 1982) is a North Korean politician who has been Supreme Leader of North Korea since 2011 and the leader of the Workers' Party of Korea (WPK) since 2012. He is a son of Kim Jong-il, who was North Korea's sec ...

for an unknown reason. It shocked observers that the three were purged as usually decedents of respected people within the DPRK government tend to be looked after and considering how revered O Jin-u was in order to be honored 20 years after his death with the title of "Revolutionary Martyr".

References

Living people Date of birth missing (living people) People from Pyongyang North Korean generals Members of the 8th Central Committee of the Workers' Party of Korea 1954 births {{NorthKorea-mil-bio-stub