SEOUL, October 11 (AJP) - North Korea marked the 81st anniversary of its ruling Workers’ Party of Korea on Saturday with a stadium performance instead of a military parade, and leader Kim Jong-un let the day pass without a speech or written message, state media reported Sunday.
The Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) and Rodong Sinmun, the party’s newspaper, reported that Kim watched the show at Pyongyang Indoor Stadium with his wife, Ri Sol-ju, and their daughter, and expressed satisfaction with the performers. Neither carried any remarks from him.
A year ago, the scene in Pyongyang was very different. For the 80th anniversary, Kim reviewed a military parade in Kim Il-sung Square with Chinese Premier Li Qiang, Russian Security Council Deputy Chairman Dmitry Medvedev and To Lam, general secretary of Viet Nam’s Communist Party, at his side. He addressed both the parade and a mass celebration held on the eve.
In 2024, a year without a milestone, Kim still marked the occasion. He published a commemorative article in Rodong Sinmun and hosted a banquet where Russian Ambassador Alexander Matsegora sat as his personal guest.
North Korea dates the party’s founding to Oct. 10, 1945, and saves its largest celebrations, including parades, for anniversary years ending in zero or five.
This year’s program featured songs praising the party, vocal music, dance, acrobatics, gymnastics and a military band, and closed with the national anthem. Members of the Presidium of the party’s Politburo, senior government officials, Pyongyang residents and members of foreign diplomatic missions in the capital filled the audience, according to KCNA.
The day before, Presidium members and other senior officials visited the Kumsusan Palace of the Sun, the mausoleum that holds the bodies of Kim’s grandfather, state founder Kim Il-sung, and his father, Kim Jong-il. A flower basket was laid in Kim Jong-un’s name, but the reports did not say he attended. In a separate dispatch, KCNA said party officials toured the Party Founding Museum, without giving a date.
Rodong Sinmun ran a front-page editorial on Saturday crediting the party with the Kanggon, a new 5,000-ton destroyer commissioned last month, and a housing development in Pyongyang’s Hwasong district. Lao President Thongloun Sisoulith sent Kim a congratulatory message, and Kim replied with thanks, KCNA said.
Pyongyang’s most pointed words of the week came from Kim’s sister, Kim Yo-jong, director of the party’s General Affairs Department. In statements carried by KCNA on Thursday and Friday, she rejected Seoul’s plan to send medical equipment to the North. She said that, “by the mandate of the head of state,” North Korea would “more clearly turn away from and ignore the human scum of South Korea.”
South Korea’s Ministry of Unification disclosed the aid plan on Wednesday, listing 1,431 items in 166 categories, including CT scanners, X-ray machines and ambulances. The ministry said it had not yet discussed with Pyongyang how the equipment would be delivered.
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