Pak Chong-ae

Life and career Pak was born in 1907 in North Hamgyong Province, Korean Empire. She went to the Soviet Union to study in the Moscow State University. She then worked for the Soviet Union as an intelligence agent before entering politics. In the early 1930s, she was dispatched to Korea for duty, She supported Kim Il Sung in the early days of North Korean political life and became one of his strongest supporters.

It is possible that Pak informed the Chinese about North Korea's plans to attack South Korea just prior to the outbreak of the Korean War.

In 1953, she headed the North Korean delegation to Stalin's funeral in Moscow, where her Chinese counterpart was the Foreign Minister Zhou Enlai. Later that year, she participated in a purge against the former South Korean Workers' Party members who had fallen out of Kim Il Sung's favor. Pak became one of five members, and the only woman, She was present when he signed the Armistice document and also accompanied him on trips abroad. As one of the most important members of the committee she was uniquely "able to advise Kim Il-sŏng on his personal life, and to speak for women as well as on matters of general concern".

She was the first chairperson of the North Korean Central Committee of the Korean Democratic Women's League. During her tenure, lasting from the 1940s to 1965, She has also revived the North Korean Order of the National Flag, both first and second class.

Pak herself was purged by Kim at the 2nd Conference of the WPK in October 1966. The conference saw purges of mostly officials in charge of economic affairs, but Pak was not one of them, implying that she was purged because of Kim's desire to concentrate power. Pak was expelled to the countryside after the purge. She resurfaced in public life in 1986.