Thae Yong-ho served as the North’s deputy ambassador in London; now he could win the Gangnam constituency

As South Korea becomes the first country to hold national elections in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic, candidates have been resorting to imaginative canvassing tactics beyond hand-shaking and rallies.

So it was that a bespectacled 57-year-old political newcomer took to the streets of Seoul’s swanky Gangnam district in a vibrant pink hoodie and matching baseball cap to record a rap video posted online for voters last week.

It was all the more striking because the candidate demonstrating his Gangnam style was Thae Yong-ho, until four years ago a high-ranking North Korean apparatchik from a prominent family with ties to the ruling Kim dynasty.

In 2016 he defected in London, where he had served as deputy ambassador, the most senior North Korean diplomat to abandon