Make of it what you will, but it appears to me that the successor to Kim Jong-il is becoming more likely considering how North Korea is doing nothing to squash rumors like this:

Conservative newsletters in South Korea specializing in North Korean affairs yesterday said Kim Jong Un, the youngest son of the North’s supreme leader Kim Jong Il, is the heir apparent.

Rumors are also swirling that the son threw a party Feb. 16 for high-ranking military officials to mark his father’s 67th birthday.

With the communist country’s media also cultivating an atmosphere for a power transfer, all eyes are on whether the March 8 general elections of the North’s Supreme People’s Assembly will confirm these reports.  [Donga Ilbo]