OLYMPIC GAMES
North Korean star has south in swoon
Glamorous singer and politically powerful Hyon Song-wol turns heads leading the North Korean Olympic inspection delegation
Seoul — South Korea went into swoon mode on Sunday — at the feet of a party apparatchik from North Korea. Hyon Song-wol is, how-ever, no dourly dressed, suit-wearing bureaucrat from the nuclear-armed nation but the leader of Pyongyang’s most popular girl band. Cameras followed her every move as the glamorous singer swept through Seoul at the head of a North Korean delegation sent to inspect performance venues for the Pyeongchang Olympic Games. Wearing a fur muffler and exuding an air of confident calm, Hyon was unfazed by the throng of cameras that followed her everywhere. Believed to be in her late 30s or early 40s, Hyon is as close to a megastar as North Korea probably has. Her song Excellent Horse-like Lady — a term describing a smart and energetic woman — was a big hit in the 2000s. She is a politically powerful figure as an alternate member of the central committee of North Korea’s ruling Workers’ Party. Hyon was once rumoured to be a former girlfriend of North Korean leader Ki...
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