According to a recent study, Kim Jong Un built eight additional luxurious villas in his "Forbidden City" because of worry that his adversaries would find out where he sleeps.

North Korea has increased the frequency of its missile tests this year, and the country's leader has showed symptoms of anxiety about being the target of an attack amid UN sanctions and ongoing tension with the United States.

Kim Jong Un Builds New Luxury Mansions

Kim Jong Un has also executed other political individuals and members of his own family out of fear of being overthrown. The "Forbidden City" of Kim Jong Un and the regime's elite, known as the VIP area of downtown Pyongyang, is where construction is now taking place, according to a report from North Korea Leadership Watch.

The Leadership Watch blog's expert Michael Madden predicts that the new structures would be residences for the leader, which would make a "decapitation attack" more difficult. Per Mirror, the strategy was inspired by Qin Shi Huang, China's first emperor, who is renowned for sleeping in a new place each night to escape being slain.

However, there are other options, and the new houses may belong to members of his other families or other favored individuals. According to Madden, Kim Jong Un has roughly 13 residential estates in North Korea that include homes for him and his family as well as social and eating establishments.

For Kim Jong Un, the estate is well situated to satisfy both his renowned appetite and his desire to grab the levers of power. Additionally, Kim Jong Un feels at home at the property.

Its grandest mansion, which was constructed for his father and predecessor, Kim Jong Il, was where he spent a majority of his childhood. The Ch'angkwangsan Compund is only one of several comparable estates that the dictator may choose from, therefore there are other obstacles that would-be assassins must cross in addition to this vast number of homes.

The mansions may possibly serve as brand-new residences for his relatives, the Ko family (Kim Jong Un's maternal family), or his in-laws. Or they could be constructed for privileged members of the ruling party or for preferred assistants.

In any event, they provide a quality of living that is unfamiliar to the majority of North Koreans, for whom food and even energy are becoming increasingly erratic commodities, as per Daily Mail.

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Pope Francis Requests To Visit North Korea

Pope Francis, meanwhile, has requested an invitation from Pyongyang, declaring in a television interview on Friday that he would not pass down the chance to come and promote peace.

The idea of a papal visit to the reclusive, nuclear-armed nation was first raised in 2018, when Moon Jae-in, the former president of Seoul, engaged in diplomatic negotiations with Kim Jong Un. According to News18, Pope Francis indicated at the time that he would be happy to travel if he received an official invitation. Moon, a Catholic, said during a summit that Kim informed him the pontiff would be "enthusiastically" welcomed.

But after a second summit between Kim and the then-US president Donald Trump failed in 2019, discussions between Pyongyang and Seoul have essentially come to a stop. Since Yoon Suk-yeol, a hardline new president of South Korea, took office in May, relations between the North and South Korea have reached an extremely low point. Yoon offered the North assistance in exchange for denuclearization, but the Kim Jong Un dictatorship mocked the proposal.

North Korea has conducted a record number of weapons tests this year, including firing an intercontinental ballistic missile at full range for the first time since 2017. The North blamed South Korea for its May outbreak of COVID-19 and earlier this month threatened to "wipe out" Seoul's authorities in retaliation.

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