South Korean Experts Reveal Secret of Kim Jong-un's Shoes

The historic meeting between North Korea’s Kim Jong-un and his South Korean counterpart Moon Jae-in was held a week ago, but is still making headlines.

Many aspects of Kim Jong-un’s life remain unknown, but South Korean journalists at Chosun Ilbo might have just unraveled one of the mysteries – his real height…having examined his footwear. The media outlet provided seven experts with footage of Kim meeting Moon, and they were closely studying the North Korean leader.

READ MORE: WATCH Kim Jong-un Pushes Photographer to Clear Way for His Wife in South Korea

Kim appeared to be less than 2.5 cm shorter than his South Korean counterpart, whose height is estimated at 172 cm, but the experts noticed that a high slope on the front of his shoes looked as if he was wearing height-increasing insoles, with one of them suggesting that Kim’s real height was only 162,5 cm.

Previously, Kim Jong-un was considered being around 170 cm, although the source of the information was unknown – many pictures of him turned out to have been photoshopped to make him look taller.

It appears that in Korean society, which earlier this year started a beauty revolution, promoting male make-up, short height is largely viewed as undesirable. To Korean men every centimeter counts: lots of them wear shoe pads to increase their height, with many leading companies selling footwear with elevated insoles – ranging anywhere from 1 to 10 centimeters – already stitched in.