SEOUL, South Korea - North Korea replaced its prime minister Wednesday during a session of its rubber-stamp parliament, the country's state media reported.
Pak Pong Ju was relieved of the premiership and replaced by Kim Yong Il, the official Korean Central News Agency reported, without giving any reasons for the shuffle.
Pak, previously the minister of chemical industries, had been appointed in 2003 in a move that was believed to indicate the North's attempts to revive its moribund economy. His replacement Kim had served as transport minister since 2003.
North Korean leader Kim Jong Il attended the meeting of the Supreme People's Assembly, KCNA reported, but apparently did not make any comments there.
The move comes amid intense diplomacy aimed at getting North Korea to meet a Saturday deadline to shut down its main nuclear reactor under a February disarmament agreement in exchange for aid and political concessions.
At the assembly's meeting Wednesday, the delegates heard reports on the budget with officials claiming success in meeting goals for revenue and spending, although no money figures were given.
Vice Premier Kwak Pom Gi, who led the session instead of the ousted Pak, said the country's main economic goal this year was to "improve the standard of people's living" along with the "modernization of the national economy," according to KCNA.
The North's Supreme People's Assembly usually convenes once or twice a year to approve budgets or discuss policy, but its voice is relatively meaningless in the country ruled with an iron fist by Kim Jong Il.
The premiership is among several high-ranking positions, but the country's No. 2 leader is Kim Yong Nam, the president of the Presidium of the Supreme People's Assembly.
North Korea is one of the poorest countries in the world, where as many as 2 million people are estimated to have died from famine that began in the 1990s after the North lost its main Soviet benefactor in addition to poor harvest from mismanagement and natural disasters.
