North Korean leader Kim Jong-Il took youngest son Kim Jong-Un on a "field guidance" trip as part of his grooming to take over the Stalinist nation, a Japanese newspaper reported on Sunday.
The Mainichi Shimbun said it had obtained an official North Korean "internal document" which described a visit by the father and son to a provincial agricultural university earlier this year.
The literature described itself as "the first official document regarding General Comrade Kim Jong-Un", the daily said. Information on the Kim family is tightly controlled by North Korea's official media.
Kim Jong-Il and his late father, North Korea's founder Kim Il-Sung, used "field guidance" trips to military units, factories, farms and other places to demonstrate their absolute leadership in the communist state.
The document, dated April 26, said that Kim Jong-Il visited Wonsan University of Agriculture in the eastern port city of Wonsan, telling activists there that he had brought Kim Jong-Un, the newspaper reported.
Kim Jong-Il has three sons from two marriages, according to outside analysts. Jong-Un is said to be 26 years old.
Succession speculation has intensified since Kim senior, now 67, suffered a stroke in August 2008. Widespread reports say he has chosen Jong-Un to inherit power.
But South Korean officials and analysts have said relations have cooled between the two Kims after the son intervened in military personnel matters without consulting his father in the middle of this year.
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