A North Korean official who was reported to be in a labour camp has appeared at a concert alongside Kim Jong-un.

Last Friday, Kim Yong-chol was widely reported to have been sent to a re-education camp as punishment.

But on Sunday, North Korean media showed him at a musical performance together with other officials.

Mr Kim, seen as the North Korean leader’s right hand man, had been in the US to prepare for the Hanoi summit.

Reports of purges or executions of high-ranking North Koreans falling out of favour are difficult to verify and often prove inaccurate.

South Korean media as well as the government in Seoul have alleged purges in the past but in several cases the persons in question have later turned up alive and still alongside Kim Jong-un.

Kim Yong-chol’s attendance at Sunday’s concert does not mean for certain that he has never been sent to a camp, but he appears to not be in one right now.

The reports on Friday also said that Kim Hyok-chol, the former North Korean envoy to the US, was executed at an airport in Pyongyang. He was also a key figure in talks ahead of the US-North Korea summit in Hanoi in February.

Kim Hyok-chol was not among the attendees listed for Sunday’s event but state media have not yet reported any execution or punishment so his whereabouts remain unclear.

A prominent example of a North Korean falsely presumed executed is singer Hyon Song-wol who in 2013 was alleged to have been shot in a “hail of machine gun fire while members of her orchestra looked on”.

In 2018 though, the singer appeared in Seoul leading a visiting North Korean delegation ahead of the Winter Olympics.

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