Kim Hong-il (general)
Kim Hong-il (23 September 1898 – 8 August 1980) was a Korean independence activist and a general of the Second Sino-Japanese War and the Korean War, who later became a diplomat and politician in South Korea. Born in North Pyongan, he did his early schooling in China and Korea, and had a brief career as a teacher before his connections with the nascent Korean independence movement led to his imprisonment. He fled into exile in China in 1918, and served in the Kuomintang's National Revolutionary Army from 1926 to 1948, following which he moved to the newly-independent South Korea to join the Republic of Korea Army. He commanded South Korea's I Corps during the first year of the Korean War, and was then sent to Taipei as South Korea's ambassador to the Republic of China, which by then had retreated to Taiwan. His assignment there ultimately lasted nine years. He returned to South Korea in 1960 following the April Revolution which ended the rule of Syngman Rhee, and served briefly as Minister of Foreign Affairs under the Park Chung-hee junta. He ran for the National Assembly, first unsuccessfully in 1960 and 1963, and was then elected in 1967 and became a major figure in the opposition New Democratic Party.
Death and state funeral of Kim Jong-il
After the death was announced, the South Korean military was put on high alert. The South's National Security Council, worried that political jockeying in North Korea could destabilise the region, also convened for an emergency meeting. President Lee Myung-bak cancelled the rest of his Monday schedule and in a statement, declared, "[f]or the sake of the future of the Republic of Korea, peace and stability on the Korean Peninsula is more important than anything else. It should not be threatened by what has happened. We must make thorough preparations to maintain peace and stability and continue to work closely with the international community ... All citizens are asked to go about their lives without wavering so that peace and stability on the Korean Peninsula will not be hampered". No government officials from Seoul paid condolences, according to the Unification Ministry. Lee Hee Ho, the 89-year-old widow of former South Korean President Kim Dae-jung, and Hyundai Group Chairwoman Hyun Jeong-eun led a private group of 18 South Koreans on a two-day visit, where state media showed them being greeted by Jong-un on 26 December.