North Korea's longtime ceremonial head of state Kim Yong Nam has died

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — Kim Yong Nam, a longtime North Korean ceremonial head of state best known for his trademark propaganda-filled speeches with a deep, booming voice in support of the ruling Kim dynasty, has died, state media reported Tuesday.

The Korean Central News Agency said that Kim Yong Nam, former president of the Presidium of North Korea’s rubber-stamp Supreme People’s Assembly from 1998 to 2019, died Monday of multiple organ failure at the age of 97.

KCNA said that leader Kim Jong Un visited the bier of Kim Yong Nam early Tuesday to express deep condolences over his death. Kim Yong Nam is not related to Kim Jong Un, the third generation of his family to rule North Korea since its foundation in 1948.

“Comrade Kim Yong Nam faithfully upheld the party's ideology and leadership and displayed his distinctive competence and experience on the international stage, making notable contributions in the history of our country's politics and diplomacy,” KCNA said.

KCNA said North Korea will hold a state funeral for him on Thursday. It released a list of 100 funeral committee members with Kim Jong Un’s name at the top.

Born in 1928 into “a patriotic family” resisting then Japanese colonial rule of the Korean Peninsula, Kim Yong Nam held a string of top posts since he joined the ruling Workers’ Party in the mid-1950s, according to KCNA. His tenure as head of North Korea's parliament made him the country's nominal head of state and allowed him to appear frequently in state media greeting visiting foreign dignitaries.

But the true power was held by the Kim family, which maintains absolute control of North Korea's 26 million people. Kim Jong Un, grandson of state founder Kim Il Sung, took power upon his father Kim Jong Il’s death in 2011 in the country’s second hereditary power transfer.

In February 2018, Kim Yong Nam traveled to South Korea with Kim Jong Un’s influential sister, Kim Yo Jong, to attend the opening ceremony of the Pyeongchang Winter Olympics as North Korea sought better ties with South Korea and the U.S. after years of heightened animosities on the Korean Peninsula. At the opening ceremony, Kim Yong Nam and Kim Yo Jong sat within feet of then-U.S. Vice President Mike Pence, though the two sides made no apparent contact.

That Pyeongchang trip made Kim Yong Nam the highest-level North Korean official to visit South Korea since 2014. North Korea's temporary diplomatic openness peaked when Kim Jong Un met U.S. President Donald Trump three times from 2018-19, before the high-stakes summitry collapsed due to wrangling over U.S.-led sanctions on North Korea. Trump recently expressed his desire to meet Kim Jong Un again during his trip to South Korea last week, but North Korea didn't respond.

South Korean Unification Minister Chung Dong-young, a supporter of greater reconciliation with North Korea, expressed his condolences over Kim Yong Nam’s death.

“He contributed to opening South-North Korea dialogue by coming to South Korea as head of a North Korean delegation to the Pyeongchang Winter Olympics in 2018,” Chung said in a statement. “I also recall I had meaningful talks with him about peace on the Korean Peninsula and development of South-North Korea relations” during meetings in 2005 and 2018, both in Pyongyang.

Kim Yong Nam's influence was seen as waning due to his age. In April 2019, he was replaced by Choe Ryong Hae, one of Kim Jong Un’s close confidants who had previously served as the top political officer of North Korea's 1.2 million-member military.

Kim Yong Nam’s career epitomized that of a successful North Korean bureaucrat. He survived major political purges through the 1970s. He was appointed to the powerful Politburo in 1978 and served 15 years as foreign minister, starting in 1983. He was left intact even when Kim Jong Un orchestrated a series of purges and executions, including the spectacular 2013 killing of his powerful uncle, in the early years of his rule in an apparent bid to remove his potential rivals from the old guard.

North Korea watchers also say Kim Yong Nam had an expertise in third-world diplomacy. He was a frequent participant in gatherings of nations that consider themselves independent from major power blocs, including the 2012 Non-Aligned Movement summit in Iran.

People who met Kim Yong Nam described him as mild-mannered but staunch in his opinions.

“I found Kim Yong Nam a puzzling figure. In greetings before business began, he was cordial and relaxed, but once at work, he relentlessly followed his script in a way that reminded of former Soviet foreign minister Andrei Gromyko,” former Washington Post reporter Don Oberdofer wrote in his book, “The Two Koreas.”

In a testament to his loyalty to the ruling dynasty, Kim Yong Nam read an elegy to Kim Il Sung when he died in 1994. Kim Yong Nam also undertook the job of formally nominating Kim Jong Il to be chairman of the National Defense Commission after the son observed a three-year mourning period.

A native of Pyongyang, Kim Yong Nam studied at Kim Il Sung University and Moscow State University.

Former Associated Press writer Sam Kim contributed to this report.

FILE - Kim Yo Jong, sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, right, and North Korea's nominal head of state Kim Yong Nam, talk before the start of the preliminary round of the women's hockey game between Switzerland and the combined Koreas at the 2018 Winter Olympics in Gangneung, South Korea, Feb. 10, 2018. (AP Photo/Felipe Dana, File)

In this photo provided by the North Korean government, its leader Kim Jong Un, back third left, offers his condolences in front of the coffin of Kim Yong Nam at an undisclosed location in North Korea, early Tuesday, Nov. 4, 2025. Independent journalists were not given access to cover the event depicted in this image distributed by the North Korean government. The content of this image is as provided and cannot be independently verified. Korean language watermark on image as provided by source reads: "KCNA" which is the abbreviation for Korean Central News Agency. (Korean Central News Agency/Korea News Service via AP)

FILE - North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, right, waves while Kim Yong Nam, third left, Choe Ryong Hae, second left, and Pak Pong Ju, center, clap during a military parade April 15, 2017, in Pyongyang, North Korea to celebrate the 105th birth anniversary of Kim Il Sung, the country's late founder and grandfather of current ruler Kim Jong Un. (AP Photo/Wong Maye-E, File)

FILE - Kim Yong Nam, head of the Presidium of the Supreme People's Assembly of North Korea, speaks with the Associated Press at the Mansudae Assembly Hall in Pyongyang, North Korea, Oct. 4, 2013. (AP Photo/David Guttenfelder, File)

CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) — President Donald Trump is set to meet Thursday at the White House with Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado, whose political party is widely considered to have won 2024 elections rejected by then-President Nicolás Maduro before the United States captured him in an audacious military raid this month.

Less than two weeks after U.S. forces seized Maduro and his wife at a heavily guarded compound in Caracas and brought them to New York to stand trial on drug trafficking charges, Trump will host the Nobel Peace Prize laureate Machado, having already dismissed her credibility to run Venezuela and raised doubts about his stated commitment to backing democratic rule in the country.

“She’s a very nice woman,” Trump told Reuters in an interview about Machado. “I’ve seen her on television. I think we’re just going to talk basics.”

The meeting comes as Trump and his top advisers have signaled their willingness to work with acting President Delcy Rodríguez, who was Maduro’s vice president and along with others in the deposed leader's inner circle remain in charge of day-to-day governmental operations.

Rodríguez herself has adopted a less strident position toward Trump and his “America First” policies toward the Western Hemisphere, saying she plans to continue releasing prisoners detained under Maduro — a move reportedly made at the behest of the Trump administration. Venezuela released several Americans this week.

Trump, a Republican, said Wednesday that he had a “great conversation” with Rodríguez, their first since Maduro was ousted.

“We had a call, a long call. We discussed a lot of things,” Trump told reporters. “And I think we’re getting along very well with Venezuela.”

In endorsing Rodríguez, Trump has sidelined Machado, who has long been a face of resistance in Venezuela. She had sought to cultivate relationships with Trump and key advisers like Secretary of State Marco Rubio among the American right wing in a political gamble to ally herself with the U.S. government. She also intends to have a meeting in the Senate on Thursday afternoon.

Despite her alliance with Republicans, Trump was quick to snub her following Maduro’s capture. Just hours afterward, Trump said of Machado that “it would be very tough for her to be the leader. She doesn’t have the support within or the respect within the country. She’s a very nice woman, but she doesn’t have the respect.”

Machado has steered a careful course to avoid offending Trump, notably after winning last year’s Nobel Peace Prize, which Trump coveted. She has since thanked Trump and offered to share the prize with him, a move that has been rejected by the Nobel Institute.

Machado’s whereabouts have been largely unknown since she went into hiding early last year after being briefly detained in Caracas. She briefly reappeared in Oslo, Norway, in December after her daughter received the Nobel Peace Prize on her behalf.

The industrial engineer and daughter of a steel magnate began challenging the ruling party in 2004, when the nongovernmental organization she co-founded, Súmate, promoted a referendum to recall then-President Hugo Chávez. The initiative failed, and Machado and other Súmate executives were charged with conspiracy.

A year later, she drew the anger of Chávez and his allies again for traveling to Washington to meet President George W. Bush. A photo showing her shaking hands with Bush in the Oval Office lives in the collective memory. Chávez considered Bush an adversary.

Almost two decades later, she marshaled millions of Venezuelans to reject Chávez’s successor, Maduro, for another term in the 2024 election. But ruling party-loyal electoral authorities declared him the winner despite ample credible evidence to the contrary. Ensuing anti-government protests ended in a brutal crackdown by state security forces.

Janetsky reported from Mexico City. AP Diplomatic Writer Matthew Lee in Washington contributed to this report.

FILE - U.S. President George Bush, right, meets with Maria Corina Machado, executive director of Sumate, a non-governmental organization that defends Venezuelan citizens' political rights, in the Oval Office of the White House, Washington, May 31, 2005. (AP Photo/Charles Dharapak, File)

FILE - Opposition leader Maria Corina Machado gestures to supporters during a protest against President Nicolas Maduro the day before his inauguration for a third term, in Caracas, Venezuela, Thursday, Jan. 9, 2025. (AP Photo/Ariana Cubillos, file)