North Korean Athletes: We're 'Longing' for Missing Kim

Kim Jong Un has disappeared from public view, but he's apparently not far from the hearts of North Korea's 273-member delegation to the Asian Games, which last night held what the AP calls an "Evening longing for respected Marshal Kim Jong Un." Says an apparently straight-faced North Korean sports minister, "the minds of all members of the delegation and players are running to him, whom they long to see, awake or asleep." There were musical numbers, adds the AP, including songs titled "We Cannot Live Without You" and "Warm Feelings," which were reportedly meant to convey "the single-minded unity" and "unbreakable blood ties" all North Koreans share with Dear Leader, per KCNA.

The dripping outpouring of emotion was perhaps not coincidentally held in the Games' host city of Incheon, South Korea, where the Pyongyang delegation has set world records and collected various gold medals—triumphs they dedicate to Kim's "loving care." And it comes amid what the Guardian calls "a rare display of openness about their leader's health," which North Korean officials have described as an "uncomfortable physical condition." (More North Korea stories.)