Kim Man-il


Kim Man-il was the second son and child of North Korean leader Kim Il-sung and his first wife, Kim Jong-suk.

Biography

Soviet records show that he was born Alexander Irsenovich Kim in 1944 in the Soviet Russian village of Vyatskoye. Inside his family, he was nicknamed Shura. Official North Korean biographies state that Shura and his older brother Kim Jong-il got along very well and played together.
Kim Man-il's death is shrouded in mystery. North Korean sources claim that in the summer of 1947 or 1948, Shura and his brother were playing in a pond in the city of Pyongyang, when Shura accidentally drowned. However, Russian sources indicate that he fell in a well in Vyatskoye and drowned, prior to the family moving back to Korea. Official records state that Kim Jong-il was devastated and could never get over the trauma of losing his younger brother. Kim Man-il's alleged grave is located in Vyatskoye. In 1949, his mother, Kim Jong-suk died while giving birth to a stillborn girl.