Why Does the West Deny the Reality of the DPRK?

 

Foreigners on a visit to the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea are surprised to see that the reality of the country is quite different from how it is described by the West. In fact, it is almost impossible to find an article which fairly assesses the reality of the country in the publications of the Western countries including the US.

Then, why does the West deny its reality? It is necessary to observe its reality in comparison to the reality in the West.

Every citizen in the DPRK has a right to elect and to be elected. Workers, farmers and intellectuals can be elected deputies to people’s assemblies at all levels including the Supreme People’s Assembly (Parliament in the Western countries), and participate directly in the state administration. In the West, however, the right to elect and to be elected is granted according to the duration of residence and property status. It is rare that workers and peasants are elected to the Parliament or local councils.

Unemployment always exists in any Western country no matter how developed it may be, but there is no word unemployment in the DPRK. The state provides all citizens of working age with suitable jobs according to their wishes and aptitudes.

There are no homeless people in the country. The state provides houses to the working people free of charge. Ordinary workers and office employees live in the excellent apartment houses in Mirae Scientists and Ryomyong streets in Pyongyang, which are admired by many people in the world. When flooding hit the country last year, the state built new houses for the flood victims through an all-out drive. The newly-built houses numbered over 20 000.

The Korean people are not concerned about nursing, education and medical treatment. The state bears the whole burden of looking after and bringing up children. University and extracurricular educations, to say nothing of primary and secondary educations, are free. The state enforces universal 12-year compulsory education, which is a high level in the world. Ri (dong), which is the lowest administrative unit in the country, has a hospital or clinic, and residents have doctors assigned to them. Anyone receives free medical care.

Such facts, if known to the international community, will be nothing but the biggest trouble for those who are trying to isolate and stifle the DPRK. That is why the West is so enthusiastic about tarnishing the image of the DPRK.

The Offender Attempts to Judge the Victim

 

Recently some Western countries have been insisting that the “north Korean human rights issue” should be treated by the United Nations Security Council.

In retrospect, the UNSC discussed the DPRK’s “human rights issue” and passed “human rights resolutions” against it every year from 2014. However, since 2018 it has failed to put the agenda item itself up on the table as the permanent member nations failed to reach consensus. Unhappy with this situation, those who are hostile towards the country are kicking up a fuss.

In fact, it is not the “human rights issue of north Korea” but the human rights atrocities of the US and other western countries against it that must be brought to the UNSC.

They have resorted to sanctions and blockade against the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea since its nascent years, simply because it had chosen the road of socialism, the road of independence. During the Korean war (1950～1953) they used even germ weapons, massacred a large number of civilians and reduced the country to ashes. After the ceasefire, they continued hostility and intensified sanctions, at the same time as ceaselessly threatening it with nuclear war. Their hostile policy persisted even after the cold war had come to an end, and got extreme when the DPRK possessed self-defensive nuclear deterrent in response to the increasing nuclear threats by the hostile forces.

Data show that the damage inflicted upon the country by the US from September 1945 to 2005 amounted to USD 64 959.854 billion.

The current sanctions and blockade against it are human rights atrocities untold in human history. The hostile forces are blocking its humanitarian activities, not to mention its normal trade with other countries.

In spite of this, the Western countries are desperately trying to internationalize the “north Korean human rights issue,” which is truly the case of a thief crying for thief. Their real intention is to cover their human rights crimes by branding the DPRK, the victim of their violations, as the accused at all costs and, still further, execute their plans to isolate socialist Korea from the international community and stifle it by whatever means.

The DPRK Seen through Women’s Rights

 

The definition and realization of women’s social position and rights depend on the type of society they live in. The women’s rights issue can show the true nature of a society.

Then, how are they ensured in the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea?

First, women’s dignity and personality are guaranteed by law in the country.

It has taken legislative and practical measures so that women can possess and exercise equal rights with men in all fields of the state and social life. More than seventy years ago, the Law on Sex Equality was adopted to ensure women’s equality and political rights. The Socialist Constitution, the law on providing women’s rights, socialist labour law and others guarantee their rights in the political, economic, cultural and all other fields. Women’s dignity and personality are respected thanks to the state and social policies, and this has become a universal climate and virtue of the society.

Second, they freely take part in the state and social activities as legitimate masters of the country, making proactive contributions to social development.

They are eligible for deputyship to the Supreme People’s Assembly and fully exercise their political rights in the ruling Workers’ Party of Korea, working people’s organizations and other political organizations. Not a few of them hold responsible positions in their respective organs. Women are playing active and prominent roles in the fields of science, education, public health, arts and sports. What should be mentioned in particular is the fact that they exercise all their rights as equal and free members of society regardless of social position, stratum and property status. They are free from unemployment, human trafficking, domestic violence and all other fetters and forms of inequality.

Third, they enjoy special benefits from the state.

The nurseries, kindergartens and public amenities set up in residential quarters, factories, enterprises and cooperative farms make it possible for them to take part in production and social activities feeling no inconvenience. There are hospitals dedicated to women such as the Breast Tumour Institute of the Pyongyang Maternity Hospital, and it is the government policy to diagnose early and treat the women’s diseases. It is not uncommon that the state sends even an airplane and takes all necessary measures for a woman and her premature baby. The country encourages women to have many children; it assigns doctors to the women who gave birth to triplets or quadruplets and provides them with houses on a preferential basis. There are many other special benefits for them. And those with many children are awarded with the title of “Mother Hero.”

An Irish woman said: If I can be born again, I want to be born a Korean woman; the DPRK is a real heaven for women, in which their genuine rights and dignity are ensured at the highest level.

A Leader of Strong Will

 

Despite the protracted and ever-growing economic blockade and military threats by the hostile forces that are not happy with its independent advance and development, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea is steadfastly following the road of its development. Moreover, the country is dynamically advancing to achieve the ambitious objective for building itself into a powerful socialist country.

This eye-opening reality is unthinkable separated from the leadership of Kim Jong Un, president of the State Affairs of the DPRK.

The international community regards the DPRK leader as a leader of strong will.

At the Fifth Plenary Meeting of the Seventh Central Committee of the ruling Workers’ Party of Korea held in December 2019, Kim Jong Un said that a fierce confrontation with the enemy is always accompanied by the work of strengthening one’s own forces and one can take the initiative in the confrontation and achieve victory only when one gives priority to strengthening oneself. And he advanced the slogan “Let us smash straight through all the barriers hampering our advance!”

He led all the people in the frontal attack for achieving a breakthrough, so as to frustrate the hostile forces’ blockade on the strength of self-reliance. He encouraged all the units of the national economy to push ahead with sustainable development of the country by relying on domestic raw materials and resources and by constantly exploring and utilizing internal potentials and internal dynamic force. He ensured that the military capability of the country for self-defence was further bolstered up to cope with the military challenge by the hostile forces.

For the country, 2020 was a year of unexpected disasters; it had to conduct the epidemic prevention work in the face of the worldwide health crisis and, at the same time, rehabilitate the areas hit by unprecedentedly severe flooding and subsequent typhoons.

Giving absolute priority to protecting the people’s lives and security, Kim Jong Un ensured that the epidemic prevention efforts were intensified; he also saw to it that rehabilitation projects were conducted simultaneously in the disaster-stricken areas of the country. Having successfully overcome all the difficulties, he unfolded a blueprint for bringing about a brighter future; when he visited the Komdok area, a leading nonferrous mineral producer of the country, which had been devastated by the natural disaster, he set forth a long-term goal to turn it into a world-class gorge town instead of merely rehabilitating the area.

Three Hundred People for One Child

 

Three hundred people turned out in saving one child.

This is an unbelievable fact, but it really existed.

One day in October 2020, an emergency patient was brought to the people’s hospital of Sepho County, Kangwon Province, in the middle part of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea. The patient was a 3-year-old girl, who had got second- to third-degree burns owing to an unexpected accident.

As she was burnt at a too early age and lost her unconsciousness, her parents only shed tears, worrying that their daughter might be restored.

Medical officials of the hospital immediately started intensive treatment: a treatment team was organized and consultations were held on several times. The girl recovered consciousness after several days.

However, the problem was skin transplantation. The burnt area was large and deep; it was impossible to ensure the success of operation with parts of skin of a few people. Medical officials as well as her parents were at a loss what to do.

At this very moment, many people in the county came to the hospital to donate their skin parts. Most of them were those whom the patient and her parents had never seen before.

Perhaps, people with a poor knowledge of the DPRK may think that the patient’s family had financial resources for medical treatment or the people donated their skin parts to the girl for rewards. However, in the DPRK all the medical services are free of charge and people donate their skin parts without any conditions attached.

The skin parts of about three hundred persons including doctors and nurses of the hospital, officials of several institutions and working people were grafted to the burns of the girl.

Four times of operation were successfully conducted, and the patient entered the stage of convalescence. Witnessing their daughter recovering her health by day, her parents shed tears of gratitude.

Actually, this is commonplace in the DPRK.

Its people regard other’s pains as their own, and devote their own blood, skin and even life for others without hesitation. They prefer the word we rather than you or I, and live in harmony helping and leading one another forward.

Secret of the KPA’s Mightiness

 

A few years ago Internet websites carried a scene, which surprised the world people.

The Korean People’s Army soldiers were rushing to the sea to send off their Supreme Commander Kim Jong Un on his way back after inspecting their unit defending a far-flung island. Oblivious of the fact that their waists were immersed in the cold seawater, they were shedding tears while waving their hands. Many people were shocked at the sight, an acme of bursts of emotion that could be seen nowhere else in the world.

The island is situated at the hottest spot in the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, where fierce artillery firing was once exchanged with the enemy. So his entourage had dissuaded him from going there. However, Kim Jong Un dug in his heels, saying that his beloved soldiers were there, and got aboard a small wooden vessel. And on the island, he took meticulous care of the diet, bedding and cultural life of the soldiers. He also instructed the unit’s commanding officers to look after the soldiers as they would do their own brothers, and posed for a photo with them.

He has visited various army units, even the post in Panmunjom on the Military Demarcation Line where the opposing forces are levelling their guns at each other. He often said: The officers and men are my precious comrades-in-arms; what I believe in is not the modern military hardware, like guns or rockets, but the soldiers; the Supreme Commander, as well as the officers, exists for them.

The relations between the service personnel and their Supreme Commander has been established by dint of love and trust and consolidated by dint of moral excellence and tender feelings.

That’s why the soldiers did not hesitate to jump into cold seawater to see off their Supreme Commander.

There will be no yardstick with which to estimate the might of the KPA, in which the Supreme Commander and the service personnel have formed an integral whole.

So far the hostile forces have worked out many war plans against the KPA and conducted various computer simulations. But, the results were always pessimistic for them.

Had it been possible for them to input the data on the strength of the integral whole between the Supreme Commander and the service personnel as well as the powerful armament of the KPA, the results would have been worse.

Pyongyang: A Model City

 

A book, Pyongyang: A Model City with a subtitle Architecture of the DPRK Dreaming a Perfect City, was published recently.

The authors of this book are two architects from Italy and Serbia.

The book reads in part:

It is not easy to answer why we engaged in a cultural project for the DPRK for the first time. We started it with simple curiosity, and then, we found ourselves feeling more and more interested in this unknown subject.

Many people of the world are in agreement with the logic of restraining, rejecting and isolating the DPRK, so they sometimes looked at us with suspicion.

People often give questions aimed at verifying their prejudices and preconceptions rather than finding out something new. We are still convinced that “isolation” is bad for everyone, and art and architecture, foreign to that warning, can serve as an important means for cultural exchange. We are going to open up a “window” for understanding another’s culture and show another beauty through the architecture of Pyongyang by sharing the experiences of searching and understanding something quite different.

Pyongyang, seen by the two European architects who visited the DPRK in 2015 for the first time, was a utopia. Articles including those restraining urban planning, guidelines for capacity rate and land price which must be considered when starting construction, were unnecessary in Pyongyang, a city which had been laid out consistently on the basis of a plan.

They said: Pyongyang is the most perfect model city; Korean architecture has a peculiar beauty which cannot be seen elsewhere in the world.

If one reads this book, they will feel as if they have looked around all the corners of Pyongyang. However, what is more important is that they can see the appearance of its citizens on photos in the book. It is its another interesting point that they can discover something common.

Kim Jong Il’s View on Happiness

 

People’s delight is my delight and their happiness is my happiness–this was view on happiness cherished by Kim Jong Il (1942-2011), eternal Chairman of the National Defence Commission of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.

With the noble sense that people would be happy as much as he devoted, he continued his super-intense on-site guidance trips for their good throughout his life.

On these trips he had to encounter biting cold and heavy snow on the high passes, scorching heat at the farms and downpour at the construction sites. Sometimes he would leave for another round of on-site guidance in late evening or early morning after spending the previous day giving on-site guidance at several units.

If people could lead a happy life, I have nothing more to wish for–with this thought, he did not hesitate before any rough roads or trials. All the creations across the country, including a large number of renovated factories and enterprises, large-scale crop fields rezoned in standardized shapes, modern stockbreeding bases and fishing stations, power stations and gravitational waterways are associated with his devotion.

To save time, he would have a catnap in the running car or have balls of rice on the road.

He once told officials:

What is life? It is one devoted for one’s country and fellow people. Our life is nothing but one devoted for the prosperity of our country and happiness of our people.

Seeing the increasing people’s wealth and their happy look, he found the worth and joy of his life. He said that whenever he saw the people getting happier day by day, he hardened his mind to do more work for them.

In order to bring greater happiness to the people, he speeded up his field guidance in the last days of his life.

December 4, 2011 was Sunday. Though he was unhealthy, he visited the amusement park at the Kaeson Youth Park, which was laid out as a base for people’s cultural and leisure activities. That day it was especially cold, but he said that if he visited it on such a day, people would come to it on fine days to enjoy themselves.

When officials asked him to have rest, he said that it was his invariable determination and will to devote his all for the prosperity of his country and the good of his fellow people, adding that he would only advance forward holding the flag towards the future when the people would live with nothing to envy in the world. On December 15, two days before his death, he visited the Kwangbok Area Supermarket and acquainted himself with the goods to be supplied to the people.

On December 17, he passed away on the train on his way to the people.

Humane Features of Kim Jong Il

 

Kim Jong Il (1942-2011), the eternal Chairman of the National Defence Commission of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, is known to the world as a strong-minded statesman who staunchly defended the sovereignty and dignity of his country against the high-handedness and arbitrariness of the so-called only superpower in the world.

However, he was not merely a strong-minded and strict leader; many people remember him as a tender-hearted man, a man with warm humane feelings.

Here are some examples.

In July 1981 when the then director-general of the Asian Regional Institute of the Juche Idea was returning home after his visit to the DPRK, he got ill. So he had been carried to a hospital in another country. When he was receiving medical treatment at the hospital, a doctor from the DPRK visited him to his great surprise. After receiving the report about his hospitalization, Kim Jong Il had sent the competent doctor and many tonics to him. He also ensured that he met his son from India, saying that he might be missing his son during his days in the hospital in a foreign country.

Among those who formed ties with Kim Jong Il are not only adults but children including Jindallae (azalea in English). Her father, a Palestinian diplomat resident in Pyongyang, had failed to father a child for a long time, but after receiving medical treatment at the Pyongyang Maternity Hospital, his wife gave birth to a girl.

The parents sent a letter of thanks to Kim Jong Il and asked him to name their daughter. Happy with their event, Kim Jong Il named it Jindallae after a beautiful flower in Korea. On her birthdays, he would send gifts to her.

One day, Jindallae sent him a letter on one of her friends, who felt downhearted as she was going bald. Fully aware of her inner thoughts, he took detailed measures to bring her friend to Pyongyang and give her special medical treatment. Her appearance turned to that of beautiful girl with downy hair, and bright smiles lit up on her face.

Facts tell: Chairman Kim Jong Il was a man of humane feelings with which he approached all the people, whoever they were, with warm and genuine affection.

Let's Powerfully Propel Construction of Our Own-style Socialism by Enhancing Roles of City and County Party Organizations First Short Course for Chief Secretaries of City and County Party Committees Closes with Fourth-day sitting General Secretary of WPK Kim Jong Un Makes Closing Address

 

Pyongyang, March 7 (KCNA) –

The first short course for chief secretaries of the city and county Party committees, which made a new milestone for the strengthening of the city and county Party committees, renovation of the Party work and regional development in the history of our glorious Party, was closed with the fourth-day sitting on March 6.

The fourth-day sitting took place amid the strong revolutionary enthusiasm of the chief secretaries of the city and county Party committees who are determined to make devoted efforts for the development of their cities and counties and improvement of the people's standard of living, bearing deep in mind the high intention of the respected General Secretary Kim Jong Un who provided them with a precious opportunity for re-equipment and brush-up to become true Party officials honorable before the revolution and faithful to the trust of the people while carefully leading them.

Jo Yong Won, member of the Presidium of the Political Bureau of the Central Committee of the Workers' Party of Korea (WPK) and secretary in charge of organizational affairs of the Party Central Committee, had a lecture under the title of more thoroughly establishing the unified leadership system of the Party Central Committee.

He underscored the importance and significance of more thoroughly establishing the unified leadership system of the Party Central Committee in our Party building, its activities and the strengthening of its leadership and fighting efficiency, and gave an detailed explanation of the principles and tasks to be surely maintained by the city and county Party organizations to faithfully uphold the guidance of the Party Central Committee.

He called on the Party organizations to thoroughly establish the revolutionary disciplines and order of acting as one under the instructions of the Party Central Committee and unconditionally implementing the Party's decisions to the end and thus firmly consolidate all the cities and counties into iron fortresses, inviolable cornerstones reliably defending the Party and the state.

It was stressed in the lecture that the chief secretaries of the city and county Party committees should remain boundlessly loyal to the sacred duty entrusted to them by the era and the revolution, keeping in their minds the iron truth that the victory of our revolution, prosperity of the country and happy future of the people rests with defending and upholding the Party Central Committee led by the General Secretary.

Adopted in the short course was a letter of pledge representing the firm resolution of the chief secretaries of the city and county Party committees to successfully turn their regions into fortresses of single-hearted unity and socialist paradises true to the Party's grand line on developing cities and counties.

While guiding the short course, Kim Jong Un gave valuable instructions which would serve as guidelines in the work of the chief secretaries.

Saying that city and county Party committees are major combat units that organize and carry out the implementation of the Party's line and policies, he noted that the flag of victory can be fluttered on the overall fronts of socialist construction when the city and county Party committees vigorously mobilize the popular masses for the revolutionary work by properly applying the leading idea and art of the Party Central Committee.

He called upon the chief secretaries of the city and county Party committees to make the masses definitely turn the struggle for regional development into the work of their own by proficiently conducting the work with officials, Party members and other masses with higher sense of responsibility.

Saying that the chief secretaries should equip not only themselves but also the officials of the city and county Party committees with our Party's idea of and line on attaching importance to cities and counties and unite them as one and achieve practical successes by brainstorming, he inspired them with confidence that there can be no fortress unconquerable when everything is organized in keeping with specific conditions as required by the Party's policies and carried out by relying on the broad masses of people.

He noted that all the cities and counties will be turned into places good to live in when the chief secretaries set clear development-oriented goals and make uninterrupted innovations and struggle for their implementation, and introduced in detail the important works planned by the Party Central Committee for bringing balanced and rapid upheavals to local areas.

Saying that the chief secretaries should determinedly fight a way out and energetically steer the development of their cities and counties by actively applying good experience introduced in the short course to their work, he gave earnest instructions that they should always attach importance to the mindset of people and let their work be appreciated by the people.

He said that many problems raised in the work of the city and county Party committees are attributable even to the chief secretaries of the provincial Party committees, stressing that the chief secretaries of the provincial Party committees should discharge their duties in improving the work of the city and county Party committees in their provinces and guiding and assisting the chief secretaries of the city and county Party committees.

Kim Jong Un made a closing address to the first short course for chief secretaries of the city and county Party committees. Noting that our Party Central Committee attached great importance to the short course with big expectation for the role of the chief secretaries of the city and county Party committees in decisively shifting the socialist construction onto the next stage, he said that through the short course, practical experience for equipping, awakening and inspiring them once again and improving and intensifying the work of the city and county Party committees was accumulated.

He highly appreciated that the chief secretaries of the city and county Party committees across the country participated in a meeting and short course with elated political enthusiasm, cogitation and positive attitude, unanimously bearing deep in their minds the intention of the Party Central Committee.

Saying the chief secretaries should always be aware that officials, Party members and other working people in their cities and counties will keep an eye of greater expectation on them who come back after participating in the first short course, the first of its kind in the history of our Party, he stressed that the solemn pledge taken by the chief secretaries is an oath they swore before the people of their counties and a supreme task to be carried out in any case without fail.

He said that all the chief secretaries should display great courage, strenuous spirit, inexhaustible enthusiasm and devotion hundreds times stronger than ever before to determinedly strive hard with high ideal and great desire for turning their regions into the fortresses of single-hearted unity firmly linked with the Party Central Committee in idea and intention and into bases of happiness where the people enjoy actual wellbeing and civilization.

He called upon the chief secretaries to fulfill their responsibility and role in renovating the Party work and developing their cities and counties in strict accordance with the strategic and tactical policies and tasks which were set forth at the historic Party congress and the plenary meeting of the Party Central Committee and detailed in the short course.

He asked all the chief secretaries to conduct a powerful organizational and political work for implementing the Party's policies with a fresh view and attitude that they are newly appointed and start their work from now, play the role of steering the development of cities and counties well and thus bring about clear changes and successes to be welcomed and realized by the people.

Saying that the chief secretaries should possess of the spirit of unconditionally serving the people and the organizing ability and drive, practical capability and noble moral traits appropriate for officials who are in charge of regional bases of socialist construction, he warmly called upon them to make every possible effort to record in history the decisions made at the 8th Party Congress as the ones successfully implemented.

Enthusiastically appealing to them to become real servants accepted by the people on the road of serving our great people, he declared the first short course for chief secretaries of the city and county Party committees closed.

When he finished the closing address, all the participants raised stormy cheers of "Hurrah!" with boundless respect for the General Secretary who indicated clear orientation and ways for epoch-making development of all cities and counties across the country with his rare wisdom and outstanding ideological and theoretical activities and instilled them with great confidence and courage.

All the chief secretaries made a firm resolution to resolutely defend the dignity of the Party Central Committee and certainly repay the great trust of the people by thoroughly applying in their work the leadership traits of the General Secretary, who is spending the days of noble devotion to the prosperity of the country and happy life of our people, and thus registering practical success.

The first short course for chief secretaries of the city and county Party committees to be specially recorded in the militant course of our Party towards fresh victory of the revolution will serve as an opportunity of great change to cement the foundation for the development of cities and counties, regional bases of socialist construction, and dynamically propel the strengthening of our Party and overall development of the country.

Respected Comrade Kim Jong Un Has Photo Session with Participants in First Short Course for Chief Secretaries of City and County Party Committees

 

Pyongyang, March 7 (KCNA) –

Kim Jong Un, general secretary of the Workers' Party of Korea, had a photo session with chief secretaries of the provincial, city and county Party committees, who participated in the first short course for chief secretaries of the city and county Party committees, at the office building of the Party Central Committee on March 6.

The chief secretaries of the city and county Party committees were greatly excited for the great favors bestowed upon them by the respected General Secretary who specially organized the short course for the first time in the history of our Party at the supreme General Staff of the Korean revolution, gave important instructions while guiding the course for four consecutive days and had an honorable photo session with them.

After declaring the short course closed, Kim Jong Un appeared in the photographing venue, talking with chief secretaries of the provincial, city and county Party committees. Expressing the expectation and belief that the chief secretaries of the provincial, city and county Party committees across the country who should leave for their dispatched places with fresh determination and readiness would prove their sacred pledge made before the Party Central Committee and the people true with practical successes by dynamically conducting the revolutionary work as they studied and armed themselves in the short course, he had a significant photo session with them.

At the end of the photo session, the chief secretaries of the provincial, city and county Party committees raised enthusiastic cheers of "Hurrah!" in excitement in reflection of warm gratitude and loyalty to the General Secretary who repeatedly bestowed upon them great privilege and great political trust that they should become true Party officials, genuine revolutionaries holding the people with sincerity and sharing joys and sorrow with them. Kim Jong Un warmly encouraged them, waving back to the chief secretaries who were full of high confidence and fighting spirit.

The chief secretaries of the provincial, city and county Party committees made a firm pledge to present the report of loyalty to the Party Central Committee by strongly consolidating the city and county Party organizations into powerful political general staffs and surely achieving clear and actual successes desired by the people, as field political officials who received instructions directly from the respected General Secretary.