Retailers Like Walmart Have Started A War Against Apple That They Have No Chance Of Winning (AAPL) | ||
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Apple Pay, the new mobile payments system from Apple, is barely a week old, but it's already being attacked by the merchants it's supposed to be making things easier for. The war over mobile payments may be in its early stages, but it's one big retailers are poised to lose by not playing along with Apple. On Saturday, Rite Aid and CVS disabled Apple Pay from their stores, even though they have the compatible equipment that was working when Apple Pay launched last week. They also blocked Google Wallet, a similar system for Android phones that Google launched in 2012. Neither Rite Aid nor CVS will specifically say why they decided to disable Apple Pay, but it seems to be because they're part of the Merchant Customer Exchange (MCX), a consortium of the biggest retailers in the US. MCX happens to be working on its own mobile payments app called CurrentC, which is in beta testing now and expected to launch next year. But by all accounts, CurrentC is a mess and much more difficult to use than Apple Pay. For starters, it only works with your checking account, meaning you can't load your regular credit cards like you can with Apple Pay. It also requires you to scan a barcode to make payments, something proven to not be as secure as the NFC and other encrypted technology Apple Pay and Google Wallet use. Finally, CurrentC will allow merchants to track what you buy and store that data, something Apple Pay doesn't allow. MCX's public relations department, CEO, and COO did not respond to multiple requests for comment. CVS's statement Monday only confirmed that the retailer would not accept Apple Pay and would launch its own mobile payments system soon, presumably CurrentC. Rite Aid has not made a statement yet. But the drug stores' move and MCX's impending mobile payments app is already ruffling feathers at Apple and its credit card partners like MasterCard. "They've taken away an option from consumers and they haven't done anything to replace it," said James Anderson, MasterCard's senior vice president of emerging payments in an interview with Business Insider. "You'd think they would've had something in place. But we're happy to compete with it." Apple's public take on the dispute is much more diplomatic, but the implication is clear: Early feedback of the system from customers and retailers is really good, and the retailers not joining or finding ways to block Apple Pay are going to miss out. Here's what an Apple spokesperson told Business Insider Monday: The feedback we are getting from customers and retailers about Apple Pay is overwhelmingly positive and enthusiastic. We are working to get as many merchants as possible to support this convenient, secure and private payment option for consumers. Many retailers have already seen the benefits and are delighting their customers at over 220,000 locations. It's a competition the MCX retailers are ultimately going to lose. As John Heggestuen of Business Insider Intelligence points out, customers are already asking for what Apple Pay provides. They want a solution that's secure, available where they shop, compatible overseas, and available on the devices they love, namely the iPhone.
Then there's the statement from Walmart, one of the big leaders of MCX, on why it won't accept Apple Pay. Emphasis added: There are certainly a lot of compelling technologies being developed, which is great for the mobile-commerce industry as a whole. Ultimately, what matters is that consumers have a payment option that is widely accepted, secure and developed with their best interests in mind. MCX member merchants already collectively serve a majority of Americans every day. MCX’s members believe merchants are in the best position to provide a mobile solution because of their deep insights into their customers’ shopping and buying experiences. Apple Pay may not be widely accepted yet, but it uses technology that is relatively easy for retailers to implement. It's also secure, arguably more secure than a credit card because your credit card number isn't actually stored on your phone. It also only works with the user's fingerprint, so unless a thief is able to get your phone and chop off your thumb, you don't have to worry. And it's dead-simple to set up and use. There's also a strong chance that while credit card companies are open to trying different payment platforms, they might not partner with MCX's CurrentC. According to two sources familiar with major credit card companies and their plans for mobile payments, CurrentC might not use the same kind of secure technology that encrypts your credit card number like Apple Pay does. So while credit card companies may be open to trying new things, their reception might be a bit chilly towards CurrentC if it's clear that it won't be safe for customers to use. It's clear that the retailers of MCX are digging their own graves. Two of them have eliminated a viable mobile payments system without providing an alternative. The rest have chosen to ignore Apple Pay altogether. And it's all resting on CurrentC, a payments app that's more difficult to use and potentially not as secure as Apple Pay. The most likely scenario: MCX retailers will go ahead and launch CurrentC. It'll be a dud. And before long, Apple Pay, Google Wallet, and similar mobile payment methods will become the new standard. Join the conversation about this story »  | ||
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Twitter CEO Admits The World Cup Was No Help To User Growth (TWTR) | ||
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Twitter's stock was down nearly 13% in pre-market trading, after CEO Dick Costolo admitted yesterday that the company's efforts to gain new users through the World Cup didn't have much of an effect. As Business Insider reported back in July, Twitter quietly launched a special on-boarding program for new users arriving at the service during the planet's biggest sporting event, to help them find cool soccer-themed Twitter users to follow. "But we didn’t see an impact on monthly active users," Costolo told analysts on his Q3 earnings call. To be clear, Twitter is still growing, it's just growing more slowly now. It added only 13 million users in Q3. Only 3 million of those were added in the US — Twitter hasn't added more than 3 million Americans since 2012 at least. Costolo had previously said he expected the World Cup to increase engagement with users, which is different from adding new users. But monthly active users (MAUs) are what's driving the stock right now, and MAU growth is slowing. Here is Twitter's sequential growth in MAUs this year: • Q3 2014: 4.8% That decline, from 6% to 4.8%, came despite a World Cup final — the type of massive global event that Twitter believes is its natural environment. Worse, Costolo says, "in Europe there was no change in monthly active user growth over the time of the world Cup. In fact monthly active user grow slowed in line with expected seasonality in each successful month of the World Cup." If you can't add Europeans during a World Cup, when can you add them?
So now comes the real test: Q4 2014. The World Cup was actually split evenly across Q2 and Q3, so Twitter got a bump in users and engagement in both quarters. That all goes away in Q4. By that time, Costolo's reforms — new management across the board and a simplification of the user interface — should have kicked in. If Twitter continues to grow MAUs, even at this anemic pace, we'll know those changes worked. The worst case scenario, however, is that growth dips below 4%. Here are Costolo's comments on MAUs and the World Cup in full: Yeah, so the one thing I’d like to make clear is when we did World Cup last quarter it was an experience that was focused on monthly active users and was not broadly advertised to nonusers and we saw nice engagement with the product, but we didn’t see an impact on monthly active users. And we’ve gone back and looked at the numbers a number of times now that we’re in the second quarter and want you have the same confidence that we have that the World Cup did not have an impact on monthly active users in the second quarter and then I’ll give you a sense for what we’ve done in the third quarter as it may have been similar to the World Cup. As it relates to the second quarter monthly active users contribute to the World Cup, what we would say is the following; in Europe there was no change in monthly active user growth over the time of the world Cup. In fact monthly active user grow slowed in line with expected seasonality in each successful month of the World Cup. In Latin America there was a slight acceleration of net ads on the World Cup, but at most of the World Cup added 600,000 users which is immaterial and quite frankly we probably saw a derogation of those users in the following month before the quarter ended. The U.S. actually added more net ads this quarter than last quarter which is interesting on a sequential basis. Disclosure: The author owns Twitter stock. SEE ALSO: Twitter Disappoints By Hitting Expectations, Stock Tanks Join the conversation about this story »  | ||
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The Tim Cook Reveals The Reason Apple Killed The iPod Classic (AAPL) | ||
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Speaking at the WSJ.D Conference yesterday, Apple CEO Tim Cook finally revealed the reason why Apple chose to end production of the iPod Classic. Apple removed the iPod Classic from sale in September as the online store went down during the iPhone 6 announcement. Despite being introduced in 2001, the original iPod retained a loyal customer base thanks to its large storage size. The largest size was 160GB, far higher than the 64GB that the iPod Touch could hold. Loyal iPod fans were upset at the death of the iPod Classic: Now, Tim Cook has explained why the iPod Classic had to go. In an on-stage interview at the Wall Street Journal's technology conference, he said that the only problem was that the company simply couldn't get the parts to build it. "We couldn’t get the parts anymore, not anywhere on Earth," Cook said. "It wasn’t a matter of me swinging the ax, saying 'what can I kill today?'" Faced with the decision whether to redesign the outdated product or to end its production, Cook decided not to try and rebuild the iPod Classic. "The engineering work was massive, and the number of people who wanted it very small. I felt there were reasonable alternatives." SEE ALSO: 11 Products You Used To Love That Apple Has Quietly Killed Join the conversation about this story »  | ||
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Good morning! Here's what you need to know for Tuesday.
New mass grave found in case of 43 missing Mexicans | ||
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Mexico City (AFP) - Mexican authorities looking for 43 students missing since late last month have found another mass grave, prosecutors said Monday. The students went missing in the town of Iguala and the mass grave was located in the nearby town of Cocula, prosecutors said. Previously, a mass grave found containing 38 bodies was found near Iguala. But tests on 28 of the sets of remains showed they were not those of the students. Meanwhile two drug gang members were arrested Monday on suspicion of direct involvement in the disappearance of the 43 students over a month ago, Mexico's top prosecutor said. Authorities detained four Guerreros Unidos members, two of whom are believed to have helped carry out the crime that has shocked Mexico, Attorney General Jesus Murillo Karam said. A total of 56 people have now been arrested in connection with the abduction of 43 male teachers' college students, in crime-plagued Guerrero state. The students went missing after an attack by police and Guerreros Unidos cartel hitmen in Iguala that also left another six of their classmates dead and 25 wounded on September 26. Authorities still have not located the students. Murillo Karam said the four arrested Monday were the first to have confessed that they took part in the "abduction and ultimate fate of this large group of people." "Today, we have the people who carried out the abduction of these individuals," he told reporters. He said the other two detained Monday apparently were involved as lookouts for the cartel. The suspects were not immediately identified. President Enrique Pena Nieto meanwhile said he had met in Mexico City with Guerrero's new interim governor Rogelio Martinez. The president said all public safety agencies would meet Tuesday with Martinez and work on "measures to restore order and bring back public safety". Federal authorities accuse on-the-run Iguala mayor Jose Luis Abarca of ordering the attack to prevent the students from disturbing an event held by his wife as president of the local child protection institution. A Guerreros Unidos leader said after his arrest that he had thought the students were part of a rival criminal gang. He therefore approved armed actions "in defense" of his territory.
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Retailers Like Walmart Have Started A War Against Apple That They Have No Chance Of Winning (AAPL) | ||
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Apple Pay, the new mobile payments system from Apple, is barely a week old, but it's already being attacked by the merchants it's supposed to be making things easier for. The war over mobile payments may be in its early stages, but it's one big retailers are poised to lose by not playing along with Apple. On Saturday, Rite Aid and CVS disabled Apple Pay from their stores, even though they have the compatible equipment that was working when Apple Pay launched last week. They also blocked Google Wallet, a similar system for Android phones that Google launched in 2012. Neither Rite Aid nor CVS will specifically say why they decided to disable Apple Pay, but it seems to be because they're part of the Merchant Customer Exchange (MCX), a consortium of the biggest retailers in the US. MCX happens to be working on its own mobile payments app called CurrentC, which is in beta testing now and expected to launch next year. But by all accounts, CurrentC is a mess and much more difficult to use than Apple Pay. For starters, it only works with your checking account, meaning you can't load your regular credit cards like you can with Apple Pay. It also requires you to scan a barcode to make payments, something proven to not be as secure as the NFC and other encrypted technology Apple Pay and Google Wallet use. Finally, CurrentC will allow merchants to track what you buy and store that data, something Apple Pay doesn't allow. MCX's public relations department, CEO, and COO did not respond to multiple requests for comment. CVS's statement Monday only confirmed that the retailer would not accept Apple Pay and would launch its own mobile payments system soon, presumably CurrentC. Rite Aid has not made a statement yet. But the drug stores' move and MCX's impending mobile payments app is already ruffling feathers at Apple and its credit card partners like MasterCard. "They've taken away an option from consumers and they haven't done anything to replace it," said James Anderson, MasterCard's senior vice president of emerging payments in an interview with Business Insider. "You'd think they would've had something in place. But we're happy to compete with it." Apple's public take on the dispute is much more diplomatic, but the implication is clear: Early feedback of the system from customers and retailers is really good, and the retailers not joining or finding ways to block Apple Pay are going to miss out. Here's what an Apple spokesperson told Business Insider Monday: The feedback we are getting from customers and retailers about Apple Pay is overwhelmingly positive and enthusiastic. We are working to get as many merchants as possible to support this convenient, secure and private payment option for consumers. Many retailers have already seen the benefits and are delighting their customers at over 220,000 locations. It's a competition the MCX retailers are ultimately going to lose. As John Heggestuen of Business Insider Intelligence points out, customers are already asking for what Apple Pay provides. They want a solution that's secure, available where they shop, compatible overseas, and available on the devices they love, namely the iPhone.
Then there's the statement from Walmart, one of the big leaders of MCX, on why it won't accept Apple Pay. Emphasis added: There are certainly a lot of compelling technologies being developed, which is great for the mobile-commerce industry as a whole. Ultimately, what matters is that consumers have a payment option that is widely accepted, secure and developed with their best interests in mind. MCX member merchants already collectively serve a majority of Americans every day. MCX’s members believe merchants are in the best position to provide a mobile solution because of their deep insights into their customers’ shopping and buying experiences. Apple Pay may not be widely accepted yet, but it uses technology that is relatively easy for retailers to implement. It's also secure, arguably more secure than a credit card because your credit card number isn't actually stored on your phone. It also only works with the user's fingerprint, so unless a thief is able to get your phone and chop off your thumb, you don't have to worry. And it's dead-simple to set up and use. There's also a strong chance that while credit card companies are open to trying different payment platforms, they might not partner with MCX's CurrentC. According to two sources familiar with major credit card companies and their plans for mobile payments, CurrentC might not use the same kind of secure technology that encrypts your credit card number like Apple Pay does. So while credit card companies may be open to trying new things, their reception might be a bit chilly towards CurrentC if it's clear that it won't be safe for customers to use. It's clear that the retailers of MCX are digging their own graves. Two of them have eliminated a viable mobile payments system without providing an alternative. The rest have chosen to ignore Apple Pay altogether. And it's all resting on CurrentC, a payments app that's more difficult to use and potentially not as secure as Apple Pay. The most likely scenario: MCX retailers will go ahead and launch CurrentC. It'll be a dud. And before long, Apple Pay, Google Wallet, and similar mobile payment methods will become the new standard. Join the conversation about this story »  | ||
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Crisis pulls 2.6 million children below poverty line: UNICEF | ||
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Geneva (AFP) - At least 2.6 million children have fallen below the poverty line in the world's richest nations since the economic crisis struck in 2008, UNICEF said in a hard-hitting report Tuesday. The "Children of the Recession" study showed that the number of minors living in poverty in 41 countries had swollen to 76.5 million since the deepest crisis since the Great Depression took hold. "Many affluent countries have suffered a 'great leap backwards' in terms of household income, and the impact on children will have long-lasting repercussions for them and their communities," said Jeffrey O'Malley, UNICEF's head of global policy and strategy. The study by the United Nations' children's aid agency assessed members of the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development grouping of industrialised nations, as well as European Union countries. It found that in 23 of the 41 countries, child poverty had risen as a direct result of the crisis. Children were particularly hard-hit in nations that have suffered the most. In Ireland, Croatia, Latvia, Greece and Iceland, poverty rates rose by more than 50 percent. In Greece, the most symbolic of all Europe's crisis casualties, median household incomes for families with children had sunk to the 1998 level -- the equivalent of receding 14 years on the income ladder. Those in Ireland and Spain lost a decade, as did Luxembourg, even though it remains among the wealthiest economies in Europe. Families with children in Iceland lost nine years, while Italy, Hungary and Portugal lost eight. Underlining the impact of the crisis, UNICEF said the percentage of households unable to buy meat, chicken or fish every two days had more than doubled in countries such as Estonia, Greece and Italy. It said while early stimulus programmes in some countries were effective in shielding children, by 2010 the bulk of countries had pivoted to budget cuts. The negative impact on children was particularly potent in the Mediterranean region, it said. Sweeping budget cuts in social safety nets had a serious knock-on effect, UNICEF said.
- Social safety nets crucial -
"UNICEF research shows that the strength of social protection policies was a decisive factor in poverty prevention," said O'Malley. "All countries need strong social safety nets to protect children in bad times and in good –- and wealthy countries should lead by example, explicitly committing to eradicate child poverty, developing policies to offset economic downturns, and making child well-being a top priority," he added. In the United States, where extreme child poverty has risen more in this slump than during the recession of 1982, social safety nets provided key support to poor working families but were less effective for the jobless ultra-poor, UNICEF said. Child poverty has increased in 34 out of 50 US states since the start of the crisis. In 2012, 24.2 million children were living in poverty, a net increase of 1.7 million from 2008, the study showed. There was some good news, however. In 18 countries, child poverty actually fell, sometimes markedly. Australia, Chile, Finland, Norway, Poland and Slovakia, for example, reduced levels by around 30 percent.
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Pistorius trial families accept plan to appeal | ||
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Johannesburg (AFP) - The families of "Blade Runner" Oscar Pistorius and the woman he killed have accepted the decision by South African prosecutors to press for a murder conviction and a harsher sentence for the athlete. Pistorius began a five-year prison stretch on October 21 after being found guilty of culpable homicide, a charge equivalent to manslaughter, for shooting his girlfriend Reeva Steenkamp. Prosecutors announced on Monday they would appeal both the verdict and the sentence handed down after a sensational eight-month trial which put an enormous emotional strain on both families. "We take note of the state's announcement. The law must take its course," the athlete's uncle, Arnold Pistorius, said in a terse statement Tuesday. The uncle of Reeva Steenkamp, Pistorius's girlfriend until he killed her on Valentine's Day 2013, said he was happy with the move if was going to be beneficial to society. "If it's in the interest of society... then I think they should go forward if they think it's correct," Michael Steenkamp told AFP. Pistorius admitted shooting Steenkamp four times through a locked toilet door at his upmarket Pretoria home, but said he believed he was firing at an intruder and she was safely in bed. Prosecutors said he deliberately killed her after an argument, but trial judge Thokozile Masipa found the 27-year-old Paralympic and Olympic athlete not guilty of murder. Legal experts say the prosecution is likely to appeal against the judge's interpretation and application of the principle of dolus eventualis -- awareness of the likely outcome of an action -- when she acquitted the sprinter of the murder charge. Prosecutors expect to file the appeal papers "within the next few days", according National Prosecuting Authority spokesman Nathi Mncube.
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Twitter CEO Admits The World Cup Was No Help To User Growth (TWTR) | ||
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Twitter's stock was down nearly 13% in pre-market trading, after CEO Dick Costolo admitted yesterday that the company's efforts to gain new users through the World Cup didn't have much of an effect. As Business Insider reported back in July, Twitter quietly launched a special on-boarding program for new users arriving at the service during the planet's biggest sporting event, to help them find cool soccer-themed Twitter users to follow. "But we didn’t see an impact on monthly active users," Costolo told analysts on his Q3 earnings call. To be clear, Twitter is still growing, it's just growing more slowly now. It added only 13 million users in Q3. Only 3 million of those were added in the US — Twitter hasn't added more than 3 million Americans since 2012 at least. Costolo had previously said he expected the World Cup to increase engagement with users, which is different from adding new users. But monthly active users (MAUs) are what's driving the stock right now, and MAU growth is slowing. Here is Twitter's sequential growth in MAUs this year: • Q3 2014: 4.8% That decline, from 6% to 4.8%, came despite a World Cup final — the type of massive global event that Twitter believes is its natural environment. Worse, Costolo says, "in Europe there was no change in monthly active user growth over the time of the world Cup. In fact monthly active user grow slowed in line with expected seasonality in each successful month of the World Cup." If you can't add Europeans during a World Cup, when can you add them?
So now comes the real test: Q4 2014. The World Cup was actually split evenly across Q2 and Q3, so Twitter got a bump in users and engagement in both quarters. That all goes away in Q4. By that time, Costolo's reforms — new management across the board and a simplification of the user interface — should have kicked in. If Twitter continues to grow MAUs, even at this anemic pace, we'll know those changes worked. The worst case scenario, however, is that growth dips below 4%. Here are Costolo's comments on MAUs and the World Cup in full: Yeah, so the one thing I’d like to make clear is when we did World Cup last quarter it was an experience that was focused on monthly active users and was not broadly advertised to nonusers and we saw nice engagement with the product, but we didn’t see an impact on monthly active users. And we’ve gone back and looked at the numbers a number of times now that we’re in the second quarter and want you have the same confidence that we have that the World Cup did not have an impact on monthly active users in the second quarter and then I’ll give you a sense for what we’ve done in the third quarter as it may have been similar to the World Cup. As it relates to the second quarter monthly active users contribute to the World Cup, what we would say is the following; in Europe there was no change in monthly active user growth over the time of the world Cup. In fact monthly active user grow slowed in line with expected seasonality in each successful month of the World Cup. In Latin America there was a slight acceleration of net ads on the World Cup, but at most of the World Cup added 600,000 users which is immaterial and quite frankly we probably saw a derogation of those users in the following month before the quarter ended. The U.S. actually added more net ads this quarter than last quarter which is interesting on a sequential basis. Disclosure: The author owns Twitter stock. SEE ALSO: Twitter Disappoints By Hitting Expectations, Stock Tanks Join the conversation about this story »  | ||
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Tim Cook Reveals The Reason Apple Killed The iPod Classic (AAPL) | ||
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Speaking at the WSJ.D Conference yesterday, Apple CEO Tim Cook finally revealed the reason why Apple chose to end production of the iPod Classic. Apple removed the iPod Classic from sale in September as the online store went down during the iPhone 6 announcement. Despite being introduced in 2001, the original iPod retained a loyal customer base thanks to its large storage size. The largest size was 160GB, far higher than the 64GB that the iPod Touch could hold. Loyal iPod fans were upset at the death of the iPod Classic: Now, Tim Cook has explained why the iPod Classic had to go. In an on-stage interview at the Wall Street Journal's technology conference, he said that the only problem was that the company simply couldn't get the parts to build it. "We couldn’t get the parts anymore, not anywhere on Earth," Cook said. "It wasn’t a matter of me swinging the ax, saying 'what can I kill today?'" Faced with the decision whether to redesign the outdated product or to end its production, Cook decided not to try and rebuild the iPod Classic. "The engineering work was massive, and the number of people who wanted it very small. I felt there were reasonable alternatives." SEE ALSO: 11 Products You Used To Love That Apple Has Quietly Killed Join the conversation about this story »  | ||
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Some Analysts Are Really Happy That Lloyds Bank Is Cutting 9,000 Jobs | ||
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The Lloyds Bank results are out this morning: Profits in the third quarter are up an impressive 41%, but Britain's second-biggest bank is laying off 9,000 employees and closing 150 branches. The business model might well be improving, but that's at the expense of the company being viciously streamlined. It is aiming to make savings of £1 billion ($1.61 billion) per year by 2017. Even for a business of Lloyds' size, those sort of reductions are never painless. There's not yet any indication of where the axe will fall, but given the bank's commitment to boosting its IT services, that department is probably relatively safe. Many of the layoffs will almost certainly be in increasingly unused physical bank branches. This isn't the first round of massive job cuts at the bank, either. In 2011, it announced its intention to cut 15,000 jobs by the end of this year. Lloyds' share price is down about 2% Tuesday morning, but analysts aren't sounding distressed. In a note titled "Carry On Cutting," Investec analyst Ian Gordon notes the driving force for the layoffs:
Some think that the cuts are an indication of inefficiency at the bank. This from Jakub Lichwa at Daiwa Capital Markets:
Others, like Mike Van Dulken at Accendo Markets, don't mention the job cuts, but are very happy with the overall direction of the bank:
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South Korea spy agency says Kim Jong-Un had ankle surgery | ||
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Seoul (AFP) - South Korea's spy agency believes North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un, who recently dropped out of public view for nearly six weeks, had surgery to remove a cyst from his ankle, Yonhap news agency reported Tuesday. In a briefing for legislators, the National Intelligence Service (NIS) said it also had information that Kim had demoted around 200 military officers and that 50 executions had been carried out in the North so far this year. Citing ruling and opposition party MPs present at the briefing, Yonhap said the intelligence shared by NIS suggested a cyst had been found in Kim's ankle joint back in May. Foreign medical experts were flown to Pyongyang to carry out an operation to remove the cyst sometime in September or October, the agency said. Kim dropped out of sight after attending a music concert with his wife in early September. His prolonged and unexplained absence fuelled rampant speculation about his health and even rumours of a coup in the nuclear-armed state. He finally reappeared in mid-October, with state media showing him using a walking stick as he conducted a series on inspection visits to new residential complexes in Pyongyang. Competing theories for his absence had ranged widely from an extended rest period to a leadership coup, via a long list of possible illnesses and ailments including broken ankles, gout and diabetes. Kim, a heavy smoker, has shown striking weight gain since coming to power and TV footage just prior to his "disappearance" had shown him walking with a pronounced limp. The NIS intelligence suggested that Kim's weight problem could hamper his recovery from ankle surgery. Of the 50 executions carried out this year, the NIS said a number were related to an ongoing purge of those close to Kim's uncle and one-time political mentor Jang Song-Thaek. Jang was executed last December on charges of treason and corruption. On the demotion of the 200 military officers, the NIS said the apparent reason was under-performance in strategic artillery drills.
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South Korea's Spy Agency: Kim Jong Un Had Ankle Surgery | ||
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SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — South Korea's spy agency says it has an explanation of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un's mysterious 6-week-long public absence. An aide for a South Korean lawmaker says the National Intelligence Agency told legislators on Tuesday that a foreign doctor operated on Kim in September or October to remove a cyst from his right ankle. The aide to opposition lawmaker Shin Kyung-min said the spy agency disclosed the information in a closed-door briefing. Kim's lengthy absence from public view triggered speculation about his health. He reappeared in state media earlier this month hobbling with a cane. It wasn't immediately clear how the spy agency obtained the information. It has a spotty track record of analyzing developments in opaque North Korea. Copyright (2014) Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
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