North Korea marks ruling party's 81st anniversary on a modest scale
Kim Jong Un attended a celebration performance in Pyongyang but issued no anniversary message. Last year's 80th anniversary featured the unveiling of a new ICBM.
Archive image · Photo: Nicor / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 3.0 (cropped and resized)
North Korea marked the 81st founding anniversary of the Workers' Party of Korea on Saturday with a celebration performance at Pyongyang Indoor Stadium. According to the state news agency KCNA, as cited by South Korea's Yonhap, leader Kim Jong Un attended with his wife Ri Sol Ju and his daughter Kim Ju Ae. Guests included foreign diplomats, senior party and military officials and residents of the capital.
The programme of patriotic songs, acrobatics and dance stressed loyalty to the party and to Kim, KCNA reported. The agency wrote that Kim "is ushering in a great heyday of building our Party in the new era and achieving comprehensive national rejuvenation." According to Yonhap, the leader did not issue a statement marking the anniversary.
This year's celebrations were modest in scale. Pyongyang usually marks anniversaries ending in 0 or 5 with large military parades, mass gymnastics and weapons exhibitions. Last year, for the 80th anniversary, a late-night military parade was held at Kim Il Sung Square, where the Hwasong-20 intercontinental ballistic missile was unveiled.