China silent on North Korea's Kim visit

China kept silent on Friday about a reported visit by North Korea's secretive leader, Kim Jong-il, that analysts say appears intended to line up Beijing behind his dynastic succession plans.

Coinciding with the unconfirmed trip, former US President Jimmy Carter left Pyongyang on Friday with an American, Aijalon Mahli Gomes, who was arrested in January and sentenced to eight years of hard labour for illegally entering North Korea. (Reuters)