Loyalty to leader NIS chief Lee Byung-ho told lawmakers that if loyalty or a sense of common destiny was set at 100 points during the reign of nation founder Kim Il-sung, it was perhaps 50-70 under his son Kim Jong-il but is now a mere 10. The NIS claimed Kim junior has admitted how hard it is to run a country.
The spy agency believes it was pressure from China that prevented the North from launching another space rocket earlier this month to test long-range missile technology. But a lack of technical preparation also played a role.
There were widespread fears that the North would launch the rocket to mark the 70th anniversary of the Workers Party on Oct. 10.
Asked about "nuclear backpacks" that were shown off by some soldiers during the anniversary parade, the NIS said the North "does not have the technology to miniaturize nuclear weapons yet."
But an NIS officer later backtracked, saying the remark referred only to the backpacks, but the North does probably have the means to miniaturize nuclear warheads for missiles -- the official position of the government here.
Most experts do not believe that the North has the requisite technology.
The spy agency said it is constantly monitoring the North's nuclear reactor at Yongbyon and the North is still making preparations for a fresh nuclear test, if not anytime soon.
Kim Kyong-hui, Kim Jong-un's aunt and the wife of the executed eminence grise Jang Song-taek, is being treated for chronic disease in Pyongyang but does not seem to be in particularly poor health.
The NIS said it has a confidential document issued by the North's Bureau 225, an intelligence agency for overseas operations, which calls on operatives to create public opinion that North Korean box mines that maimed two South Korean soldiers were a fabrication by the South Korean government.
North Korea has some 380 informal open-air markets, the NIS said. A U.S. dollar officially trades for 106 won but 79 times that in the black market.
Some 58,000 North Korean workers are working in foreign countries.
About 3.7 million North Koreans are using mobile phones, but no South Korean-models because the regime has warned that they could be hacked, the agency said.
"On the surface, the North Koreans look as if they are loyal to