Kim Jong-il death sparks hopes of reunification for Korean-Americans

Washington, Dec.20 (ANI): Korean-Americans believe that the death of North Korean leader Kim Jong-il raises the hope that the event could ultimately lead to the reunification of North and South Korea after nearly six decades.

The largest community of Koreans outside Asia is taking the news of North Korean leader Kim Jong-il's death with equal parts elation and caution, the Christian Science Monitor (CSM) reports.

About 120,000 Koreans live in the three-square-mile enclave near downtown Los Angeles, and interviews in Koreatown Monday point to Kim's deep unpopularity in the area.

They also acknowledged that war was an equally possible outcome, given the potential for instability in the reign of Kim's 20-something son and successor, Kim Jong-un.

"Older people are relieved that he's gone," the CSM quoted general contractor Jin Park, as saying.

Sitting with three colleagues at the Vermont Galleria, Park said s Kim was even more repressive than he was portrayed in the West and his friends nod.

In his second-floor office at the Korea Daily, reporter Hwashik Bong, who has parents and grandparents in the North Korean capital, Pyongyang, says he is "afraid to cheer this news" because he thinks Korea is now the most dangerous spot on earth.

"Every time a leader dies there, they try to make trouble by provoking a quarrel, and I suspect as much now," he says.

The word from his relatives in the country is that North Korea will change to some form of collective power, he adds. (ANI)