Kim publicly sacks vice premier during Ryongsong plant inspection ahead of congress

Kim Jong Un publicly dismissed Vice Premier Yang Sung Ho during an inspection of the Ryongsong Machine Complex, state media said, thrusting a rare on-the-spot rebuke into view as Pyongyang prepares for a key party congress. KCNA published photographs of Kim at the complex and a speech that accused senior officials of chronic incompetence, and the agency said the leader ordered Yang to step down immediately.

KCNA quoted Kim saying to Yang, "Please, Comrade Vice-Premier, resign by yourself when you can do it on your own before it is too late," and declaring the dismissed official "ineligible for an important duty." State reporting accused Yang and other leading cadres of being "irresponsible, rude and incompetent," of fostering "defeatism, irresponsibility and passiveness," and of causing the project to "encounter difficulties and incur not a little amount of economic loss, experiencing unnecessary man-made confusions." KCNA also accused Yang of attempting to mock the party center with "unjust remarks and acts."

The action came as Kim presided over the opening and inspection of the first phase of a modernization project at the Ryongsong complex, which state reporting framed as part of a wider push to transform North Korea's machine-building sector. State commentary presented the renovation as essential to overcoming what Kim described as the country's longstanding economic backwardness and to building "a modernized and advanced" economy that would secure the state's future.

State outlets placed Kim's inspection on Jan. 19 and published images and text on Jan. 20. The complex was described variously as located outside Pyongyang and as being in South Hamgyong Province; state photographs showed Kim addressing workers clad in green uniforms and matching grey hats while touring factory floors. The Ryongsong facility is presented by the regime as a major machinery base supplying equipment to mines and industrial factories, part of a broader machinery-production belt that links the northeast to Wonsan. Analysts have estimated that the belt accounts for a significant share of the country's machinery output.

Observers in Seoul and elsewhere noted the public nature of Yang's removal as striking in a system that often deals with political discipline behind closed doors. Analysts drew parallels to earlier high-profile purges, including the 2013 downfall of Jang Song Thaek, and suggested that Kim's public admonishment is intended as a shock tactic to instill greater performance discipline among party and government cadres ahead of the congress.

Beyond domestic signaling, the episode carries international implications. By dramatizing managerial failings at a key industrial site, Pyongyang projects a narrative of internal renewal while warning officials that poor performance may bring swift consequences. Some analysts also see strategic dimensions to renewed attention on machine plants: modernization of machinery and industrial capacity can have downstream effects on military production lines, a concern for neighbouring states and for international nonproliferation watchers even as Pyongyang frames the work in economic terms.

The dismissal underscores the intersection of governance, economic policy and security priorities in North Korea. With a major party gathering imminent, Kim's move tightens expectations for visible results from state-led projects and signals that the regime will publicly discipline officials whose work is judged to impede those aims.