Kim's first decade: 3 US meetings, 2 dead relatives, 1 nuclear arsenal

After 10 years in power, North Korea's once youthful Kim Jong Un is now one of the world's more experienced leaders, and will look to defy the West for decades to come with his nuclear arsenal, analysts say.

Unlike most of his counterparts, with no concerns over elections or term limits and age on his side -- he is only in his late 30s -- Kim can expect to remain in office for decades, as long as his health holds up.

It is a far different perspective to a democratic politician worrying about headlines every day, and Kim already has more experience in power than most heads of state he will deal with in the future.

The arc of his first 10 years points to the trajectory to come, analysts say, from isolation to nuclear development to sharing the diplomatic stage with the world's most powerful leaders.

"North Korea will maintain its confrontational status with the United States and harass it by tactically challenging it while making sure it doesn't cross the line to completely derail its relations," Kim Jin-ha, researcher at the Korea Institute for National Unification, said.

For more than six years after inheriting power when his father and predecessor Kim Jong Il died on December 17, 2011, Kim did not leave his isolated country or meet any foreign heads of state.

Initially seen by some as a figurehead for North Korea's generals and Workers' Party bureaucrats, he brutally established his authority, executing his uncle by marriage Jang Song Thaek for treason.

He was also accused of the assassination at Kuala Lumpur airport of his elder half-brother Kim Jong Nam with a nerve agent.