Dennis Rodman may have called North Korean leader Kim Jong Un a "friend for life," but chances are the two won't be as close now that the former basketball star has let slip a major state secret: the dictator has a daughter.
Rodman, who visited the reclusive 30-year-old dictator in February, revealed Tuesday that Jong Un has a secret child.
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"[Ri Sol Ju] kept talking about
their beautiful baby daughter," Rodman told UK's The Sun of Kim's wife.
Kim Jong Un reportedly wed in 2009 and there has been much speculation that he and his wife had produced a potential heir to his communist dynasty, but the rumors have never been confirmed by Pyongyang.
"If it was a boy,
[the North Koreans] would have made an announcement," Michael Madden, editor of the online newsletter North Korea Leadership Watch, told the Washington Free Beacon, alluding to Korea’s traditionally male-dominated society.
Despite recently released propaganda videos depicting a North Korean missile attack on the United States,
Rodman told The Sun that Kim Jong Un is just a "kid" who has no interest in starting a nuclear war.
"Kim is not one of these Saddam Hussein-type characters that wants to take over the world," Rodman told The Sun. "He doesn’t want to kill anyone — he wants to talk peace."
As the grandson of the late "Great Leader" Kim Il-sung — the man who founded the West-hating state and whose birthday is still a national holiday there — he became the automatic heir to the crown when his own father, Kim Jong-il, died in December 2011.
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"[Kim Jong Un] loves basketball and so does President Obama, so they have that in common — and there is even more they could talk about if Obama would just pick up the phone and call him," Rodman told The Sun.
Reports have been swirling that
Rodman and Kim Jong Un are planning a summer vacation together.