Rivalries Within North Korean Elite Led to Purge, South's Spy Chief Says SEOUL, South Korea - South Korea's intelligence chief said Monday that Jang Song-thaek, the uncle of the North Korean leader, Kim Jong-un, who was executed this month, apparently had not plotted a coup as Pyongyang had said, but had fallen victim to intrigue within the country's elite over lucrative business deals, according to lawmakers in Seoul. Mr. Jang, 67, who was once believed to be the second most powerful man in North Korea, was executed on Dec. 12 on charges of plotting to overthrow his nephew's government, four days after he was hauled out of a meeting of the ruling Workers" Party at which he was stripped of all titles. The highly unusual public purge and execution of a member of the North's ruling family has set off widespread speculation about the possibility of a power struggle within the secretive regime. During a closed-door meeting Monday of the South Korean National Assembly's intelligence committee, Nam Jae-joon, director of the National Intelligence Service, disputed Pyongyang's assertion that Mr. Jang had tried to usurp his nephew's power. Rather, he said, Mr. Jang and his associates had provoked the enmity of rivals within the North's elite by dominating lucrative business deals, such as the sale of North Korean coal to China. "There had been friction building up among the agencies of power in North Korea over privileges and over the abuse of power by Jang Song-thaek and his associates," Mr. Nam was quoted as saying. Mr. Nam's comments were relayed to the news media by Jeong Cheong-rae and Cho Won-jin, two lawmakers designated as spokesmen for the parliamentary committee. It was through Mr. Jeong and Mr. Cho that the National Intelligence Service on Dec. 3 released the news of Mr. Jang's purge. Mr. Nam, according to the lawmakers, said that Mr. Jang's rivals had gone to Kim Jong-un with accusations of corruption on the part of Mr. Jang and his circle. When Mr. Jang's associates, perhaps too confident of Mr. Jang's influence with Mr. Kim, resisted the top North Korean leader's order to give up some of their business arrangements, Mr. Kim saw it as a challenge to his authority, according to Mr. Nam. "It appears that there is no big problem with Kim Jong-un's grip on power, because the purge of Jang Song-thaek was not the result of a power struggle," Mr. Nam was quoted as saying. Still, Mr. Nam said, the fact that such behind-the-scenes squabbling had spun out of control, to the point that Mr. Kim ordered his own uncle's execution, raises questions about the regime's internal unity. "The fissure within the regime could accelerate if it further loses popular support," the lawmakers quoted Mr. Nam as saying. Mr. Nam did not reveal the sources of his agency's intelligence, but he said his spies had learned of Mr. Jang's detention as early as mid-November. Mr. Jang was the husband of Kim Kyong-hui, the only sister of Mr. Kim's late father, the longtime North Korean leader Kim Jong-il. He appeared to have rapidly expanded his influence since Kim Jong-il suffered a stroke in 2008, and he and his wife were widely seen as caretakers for the family regime as it groomed Kim Jong-un as heir. Mr. Jang's rising profile coincided with the purges of top generals and the curtailing of the military's lucrative rights to trade in coal, iron ore and other natural resources, exports of which to China have become the biggest components of North Korean trade with the outside world in recent years. The official verdict against Mr. Jang on Dec. 12 hinted at the business deals in which Mr. Jang and his associates were involved, saying that he had "instructed his stooges to sell coal and other precious underground resources at random." Mr. Nam told the committee Monday that Mr. Kim's aunt had retained her position in the North Korean hierarchy, while the purge of Mr. Jang's other associates continued. But he denied news reports in South Korea and Japan that some of Mr. Jang's associates were seeking political asylum in Seoul and Beijing after fleeing the purge at home. Mr. Nam pointed to Vice Marshal Choe Ryong-hae, the top political officer in the North Korean People's Army, and Kim Won-hong, the head of the North's secret police and its intelligence chief, as the regime's new rising figures since Mr. Jang's execution, according to the two lawmakers. Last Friday, Ahn Hong-joon, the chairman of the South Korean parliamentary committee in charge of diplomatic and North Korea-related issues, said that Kim Jong-un was a figurehead, "a symbolic godlike figure," and that Mr. Choe pulled the strings behind the scenes, including the masterminding of Mr. Jang's downfall. Mr. Jang had earlier engineered the purge of Vice Marshal Ri Yong-ho in July last year to curtail the military's power, Mr. Ahn said, without revealing the source of his information. In a sign of Mr. Choe's rising influence, the North's main party newspaper, Rodong Sinmun, carried a lengthy article on Friday lionizing Mr. Choe's late father, Choe Hyon, as a fighter who had fearlessly defended the Kim family. Choe Hyon, who had been the North's armed forces minister, was so loyal to the Kim regime that he never stepped on Kim Jong-il's shadow, the newspaper said. Also Monday, the former basketball player Dennis Rodman left Pyongyang, where he had arrived Thursday to conduct tryouts for a North Korean basketball team. At the Beijing airport, reporters asked Mr. Rodman, who had visited the North before and says he considers Kim Jong-un a friend, whether he was disappointed not to have met with Mr. Kim on this trip. "Nope, I don't worry about it," Reuters quoted him as saying. I will see him again. Mr. Rodman has said he hopes to bring other former N.B.A. players to Pyongyang for an exhibition game against the North Korean team on Jan. 8 to mark Mr. Kim's birthday.