Kim Jong Un appears to be stepping up efforts to expand one of his private lakeside resorts and main office building complex in Pyongyang in recent weeks, NK Pro analysis of satellite imagery shows, the latest in a series of construction projects centered on improving the North Korean leader’s luxurious lifestyle. 

Construction worker camps surrounding Kim’s Yonphung Lake mansion compound appear newly active in the latest Planet Labs imagery, and workers seemed to have cleared more patches of land around the new hotel-like tower mansion there between Aug. 14 and 20. 

NK Pro reported last November on the start of the project, which appeared to stall in the first half of 2022 after the new mansion’s exterior structure was mostly complete.  

The expansion of the worker camps suggests Kim has found new resources to pour into the stalled project, while the new land clearing between the mansion and lakeshore points to efforts to build a new lakeside leisure spot or boat docks. 

Workers also appeared to start construction in two areas of the Workers’ Party of Korea Central Committee (WPK CC) headquarters in Pyongyang in July, just after finishing at least three other big projects in the compound.

First, just after wrapping up construction on a new mansion next to the WPK CC, workers began to build a new, even larger structure in place of the mansion’s garden, according to Planet Labs imagery. 

Both sit atop underground facilities whose entrance opens up to a WPK headquarters side yard a level down from there, directly across from a side entrance to an auditorium used during political events attended by Kim. 

These high-resolution images taken on May 3 and Aug. 23 show construction on a new structure between Kim’s main office and his newest mansion in the central Pyongyang compound | Images: Planet Labs PBH, edited by NK Pro

The new structure did not appear finished in a high-resolution Planet Labs image taken Aug. 23, and its purpose is unknown. It does not yet appear to be another mansion, as the top of the structure looks flat in the image — similar to administrative buildings and unlike the ornate roof of the mansion next door.

Second, workers appeared to start upgrading what the 38 North DPRK Digital Atlas identifies as a Kim family “Guard Bureau Building” located just outside the WPK CC complex’s north entrance in late July, according to the imagery. NK Pro cannot independently verify the atlas’ claim, and 38 North does not cite the source of the information. 

Workers covered roughly half of the building’s central courtyard with a new roofed structure throughout August, and the project appeared ongoing as of Aug. 23. 

Roofing work on the new structures over the building’s courtyard appeared ongoing as of Aug. 23 | Images: Planet Labs PBH, edited by NK Pro

If it is indeed a Guard Bureau building, the expansion work could signal that Kim Jong Un wishes to improve facilities and working conditions for those charged with protecting him from attack. This comes after Kim clamped down on security by covering windows of surrounding apartments and eliminating other lines of sight into his main office building complex from around downtown Pyongyang in recent years.

Previously, Kim appeared to order or approve a project to build nine new mansions last fall in another compound adjacent to the WPK headquarters, remodel part of his main office building in early 2021 and rebuild another large building next to the office in 2020. Massive new buildings were also built in the complex for the WPK Organization and Guidance Department in 2019.

The North Korean leader has also upgraded other mega-mansions around the country in recent years amid the pandemic and what state media consistently calls national economic “hardships,” including in Wonsan and near Hamhung.

Edited by Arius Derr