Radiopress, a Tokyo news agency which monitors North Korean affairs, has reported that official media in Pyongyang had carried 86 items related to Kim's public activities from January 1 to December 25.

The number was sharply down from 117 for the same period last year, Radiopress said.

It noted that the 61-year-old Kim, who commands the Stalinist state's one-million-strong armed forces and heads the all-powerful Workers Party, had stayed out of the public eye for 40 days or longer three times this year.

For 49 days in February, March and April, Kim was absent from official media, which he tightly controls, at the height of the US-led war on Iraq.

Iraq, North Korea and Iran have been described as the "axis of evil" by US President George W. Bush.

Analysts guessed at that time that he holed up with military brass to analyse the situation fearing that his country would be the next target of a pre-emptive US attack.

"I guess he's watching CNN," a Pyongyang-based Western diplomat said in Tokyo before Kim's reappearance, referring to the US news channel.

It was his longest absence from media exposure since he became head of the Workers Party in 1997, replacing his father Kim Il-Sung who died three years earlier and consolidating his status as the "Great Leader."

Then there was a 40-day media blackout in September and October while the world reflected on six-nation talks which dealt with the Korean nuclear crisis in Beijing in August.

The second silent spell spawned rumours abroad about internal troubles within the secretive state, problems with his health or that of his wife, said to be terminally ill with breast cancer.

Kim was also absent from official media for 40 days from October to December while the six nations -- the two Koreas, the United States, China, Russia and Japan -- wrangled over whether and when they would hold another meeting.

Although the number of reports on his public appearances decreased, his military-related activities rose by 24 to 56, accounting for 65 percent of the total, underlining his so-called "military-first" politics, Radiopress said.

"On-the-spot guidance" by the Kim dynasty at military units, farms and factories has long been the staple of propaganda in the totalitarian society.

Kim Jong-Il was mostly accompanied by military leaders in public, Radiopress said.

On December 24, the Korean Central News Agency reported that Kim inspected army units "almost every day and took good care of servicemen's life," leaving him and his soldiers in "perfect harmony."

The news agency has since reported Kim's public activities twice -- his visits to an army unit and a dairy farm -- without giving dates as in many other reports in recent weeks.

Radiopress said that North Korea may be trying to prevent the United States from "grasping his behavioral patterns by comparing dates in reports and information from satellites and other sources."

WAR.WIRE