North Korea Mourners

Mourners turned out in droves to pay their final respects Thursday to Otto Warmbier, the US student imprisoned for more than a year by North Korea and sent back home in a mysterious coma that proved fatal.

North Koreans who did not mourn the death of "Dear Leader" Kim Jong-il can face at least six months in prison, a South Korean media outlet said Wednesday. And those who took part in the often hysterical display of sorrow but who may not have shed "genuine tears" could be sent to re-education camps, a South Korean news website reported.

Wailing and sobbing mourners beat their chests and dropped to their knees as North Korean President Kim Il Sung's hearse, draped with a red flag and bedecked with white magnolias, crawled through the streets of Pyongyang in 1994.

Researchers scrutinizing North Korea's official images and lists of mourners paying respects to Kim Jong-il have noticed two conspicuous absences: the elder brothers of Kim Jong-un, the appointed heir.

Among countless mourners at a public square in North Korea, the kneeling middle-aged man in an off-white windbreaker stands out. The state broadcaster's camera zooms in as he wails, rocking back and forth with clenched fists, his grief punctuated by the white puffs of his breath visible in the cold of the capital, Pyongyang.

Mourners turned out in droves to pay their final respects Thursday to Otto Warmbier, the US student imprisoned for more than a year by North Korea and sent back home in a mysterious coma that proved fatal.

North Koreans who did not mourn the death of "Dear Leader" Kim Jong-il can face at least six months in prison, a South Korean media outlet said Wednesday. And those who took part in the often hysterical display of sorrow but who may not have shed "genuine tears" could be sent to re-education camps, a South Korean news website reported.

Wailing and sobbing mourners beat their chests and dropped to their knees as North Korean President Kim Il Sung's hearse, draped with a red flag and bedecked with white magnolias, crawled through the streets of Pyongyang in 1994.

Researchers scrutinizing North Korea's official images and lists of mourners paying respects to Kim Jong-il have noticed two conspicuous absences: the elder brothers of Kim Jong-un, the appointed heir.

Among countless mourners at a public square in North Korea, the kneeling middle-aged man in an off-white windbreaker stands out. The state broadcaster's camera zooms in as he wails, rocking back and forth with clenched fists, his grief punctuated by the white puffs of his breath visible in the cold of the capital, Pyongyang.