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A man who managed funds for the ousted uncle of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un has fled the isolated country and is seeking asylum in South Korea, local media said on Friday. The aide is currently being protected by South Korean officials in a secret location in China, cable news network YTN said, citing a source familiar with the matter. Jang Song Thaek, whose marriage to Kim's aunt and proximity to the young leader made him one of the most powerful men in North Korea, was reportedly relieved of his posts last month, South Korea's National Intelligence Service (NIS) has said. His aide requested asylum about two months ago and is currently in China under the protection of South Korean officials, said YTN, adding that the man has knowledge of funds held by the Kim family.

By Peroshni Govender and Pascal Fletcher JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) - South Africans woke on Friday to a future without Nelson Mandela, and some said they feared the anti-apartheid hero's death could leave their country vulnerable again to racial and social tensions that he did so much to pacify. As dawn broke and commuters headed to work in the capital, Pretoria, the commercial hub, Johannesburg, and Cape Town in the south, many were still in shock at the passing of a man who was a global symbol of reconciliation and peaceful co-existence. South Africans heard President Jacob Zuma tell them late on Thursday that the former president and Nobel Peace Prize laureate passed away peacefully at his Johannesburg home in the company of his family after a long illness. Despite reassurances from leaders and public figures that Mandela's passing, while sorrowful, would not halt South Africa's advance away from its bitter apartheid past, some still expressed a sense of unease about the physical absence of a man famed as a peacemaker.